‘India has so much talent’: Ex-Pak coach reveals why Pakistan is lagging behind

NEW DELHI: Former Pakistan Test batsman and former head coach Haroon Rasheed on Tuesday drew a stark contrast between India and Pakistan’s cricket structures, saying India now enjoys the rewards of long-term planning, strong domestic cricket and a robust age-group system, while Pakistan continues to struggle due to inconsistency and instability.Haroon told hamaraiweb.com that Pakistan’s recent performances reflected deeper problems in the country’s cricketing structure. “The recent Test defeats against Bangladesh and even before that in white-ball cricket, our performances tell the whole story of our cricket,” he said.Haroon, who has served the Pakistan Cricket Board in several roles including chief selector, coach of senior and junior teams and head of cricket academy, said the Indian system has produced a huge pool of talent, especially in T20 cricket.“Right now, India has so much talent to choose from, especially in T20 cricket. The reason is that all their players are coming through the right system from different age groups.”The former Pakistan batsman said that the lack of consistency, continuity and planning over the years has seriously damaged Pakistan cricket.“I don’t think changing the chairman so often has helped at all. I’ve worked under at least six different chairman in my time on the board, and when a new chairman comes in, that means he brings his own people, policies and thinking,” Haroon said.Haroon also emphasized the urgent need to overhaul Pakistan’s domestic structure and warned that other countries were moving ahead quickly.“There is an urgent need in Pakistan to change the domestic structure that has survived the competition between association and department cricket and come up with a new concept or we will be left behind. Even Bangladesh have now shown how they have improved.”He also questioned the repeated changes of PCB captains and said that the constant reshuffling was preventing the team from developing stability.“When you decide to appoint a captain in any format, it would be done with a lot of considerations, so how can you keep rotating captains, how will it allow the Pakistan team to be consistent and stable,” he asked.Haroon added that Pakistan had historically done better under captains who had long runs in leadership roles and warned that the country risked falling further behind if the young players were not properly groomed.“There are a lot of things that need to be put right in Pakistan cricket. Otherwise we will fall further behind. Because we are neither nurturing our young talents properly nor giving them the right coaching and exposure to prepare them for long-term international cricket.”