Mohammed Hafeez’s stint as director of the Pakistan Cricket team finally ends. Hafeez was serving as the director of the Pakistan Cricket team & Head Coach of the Men’s National team overseeing the Australia & New Zealand Tour. But just one day before the beginning of PSL he announced on social media that his stint had been cut down by the new chairmanship of PCB.
“I enthusiastically embraced my new position as a director at PCB, eager to enact positive changes. However, I’m disappointed that my originally planned four-year tenure was unexpectedly shortened by two months due to the change in leadership,” expressed Hafeez on X (formerly Twitter).
Hafeez was appointed to the dual duties in November however it was not made clear how long his stint will be. The interim administration led by Zaka Ashraf was restricted by the government from making long-term appointments. It might have been offered to him for four years but looking at the political uncertainty before the elections it was unlikely a long-term role which could never be a realistic option.
But on Thursday the PCB announced that he was parting ways with Hafeez through a statement where they expressed “heartfelt gratitude” to him. While the statement didn’t clear whether the decision to end his relationship had come from Hafeez or PCB, it was Hafeez’s statement that put all speculations to rest.
Hafeez’s Stint as Director of Cricket was full of controversy
Mohammed Hafeez’s stint as Head Coach & Director of Cricket couldn’t yield results as during his tenure Pakistan couldn’t generate desirable results. Pakistan suffered a whitewash in the Australia series for the sixth time. They were then defeated by a score of 4-1 in New Zealand T20Is with Shaheen Afridi in charge as Captain for the first time.
Haris Rauf was the key person behind the Pakistan team’s decision to cancel Haris Rauf’s contract after he refused to tour Australia. That has resulted in the cancellation of Rauf’s contract. Hafeez prevented Under-19 cricketers from playing in Pakistan’s domestic National T20 Cup, on the basis that T20s would distort the basics of their game.
Not only this but Hafeez complained about the surface in Australia where Pakistan played warm-up matches & said that Pakistan played better in the Boxing Day Test even after losing the fixture by 79 runs. He blamed technology & poor umpiring for Pakistan’s loss.
Hafeez stepped in as the Director of Cricket & Head Coach for Pakistan replacing Mickey Arthur as director and Grant Bradburn as coach after Pakistan’s consistently poor performances which resulted in Babar Azam stepping as all-format Captain. But even Hafeez couldn’t bring success back to Pakistan as they are going through a lean phase since Asia Cup 2023.
“Best wishes for Pakistan’s cricket future,” Hafeez said. “As always, I foremost take responsibility and put myself accountable for all my executions in my given time and will accordingly reveal all the cricketing and other amateur non-cricketing facts which ensure bad performances. Stay tuned…”
His statement hints at his upcoming role as a TV analyst for PSL 2024 which will begin on Saturday. Pakistan’s next assignment will begin from April which will be a home T20I series against New Zealand.
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