Pakistan cricket has become a target of ridicule and the circus continues

There was a time when chaos in Pakistan cricket was almost part of its charm. The team could be unpredictable, volatile and amazingly talented at the same time. A collapse could be followed by an extraordinary comeback, sometimes when no one saw it coming.

But there is a difference between unpredictability and dysfunction. Pakistan cricket now seems to be trying to differentiate the two.

He is becoming more and more a target of ridicule. Just when it looks like the team has hit a new low, something happens to send them down even further. The heavy loss to England was bad enough. Being 2-0 down in a Test series with one match to go was worse. Then came an extraordinary overhaul in the middle of the series involving seven players, changes in the coaching post and other shocks in the selection settings.

And all this happened while Pakistan were still in England, with one Test remaining and a chance, however slim, of salvaging something from the tour.

Pakistan lost the first Test at Headingley an innings and 103 runs earlier England beat them by 194 runs at Lord’s. They failed to reach 200 in any of their first four innings, scoring 171, 135, 110 and 194.

The cricket was miserable. The response was extraordinary.

TOO MANY CHANGES, TOO SOON

The range and timing of the response is what stands out.

Seven players — Mohammad Rizwan, Salman Ali Agha, Imam-ul-Haq, Ali Usman, Aamer Jamal, Awais Zafar and Khurram Shahzad — were dropped, while seven replacements were brought in, including five uncapped players.

Sarfaraz Ahmed, appointed head coach only in April, was dismissed and bowling coach Umar Gul also left. White ball coach Mike Hesson was appointed to lead the Test side for the final match, with Ashley Noffke joining the coaching staff. Rizwan was one of the seven players recalled by the PCB from the England tour. (Photo: Reuters)

Misbah-ul-Haq also resigned from the selection committeewhich added to the feeling that Pakistan’s cricket structure was crumbling while the team was still on tour.

There is nothing wrong with making tough decisions. Players lose form. Coaches fail. Selection boards have it wrong.

But doing all this with one Test remaining raises a fairly obvious question: where was the pre-tour planning?

If seven players can suddenly be deemed surplus to requirements, what does that say about the process that selected them in the first place? And if a coach appointed only months ago can be fired after two series, what exactly was the long-term plan?

Former Pakistan captain Ramiz Raja said the PCB had pressed the “panic button”. Shahid Afridi also criticized the move, while former coach Mickey Arthur called the decision “absolutely ridiculous”.

The problem is not just that Pakistan is losing. No one seems to know what the answer is.

TOO MANY COACHES, NO STABILITY

The latest coup is not an isolated episode. It is part of a pattern that Pakistan cricket has followed for some time.

Look at the coaching turnover. Gary Kirsten took charge of Pakistan’s white-ball teams in April 2024 on a two-year contract, but resigned six months later.

Jason Gillespie, appointed Test coach around the same time, also left in December 2024. His departure came after his authority was curtailed and amid disagreements with the PCB over the running of the Test setup.

The two coaches who came together to give Pakistan a new direction were therefore gone in the same calendar year.

Then came another reset.

Sarfaraz Ahmed has now been recalled after just two runs in charge, having overseen five defeats in six Tests. Appointed white-ball coach, Hesson was suddenly asked to take charge of the Test side instead. Head coach Sarfaraz and bowling coach Umar Gul were sacked by the PCB. (Photo: AP)

It’s hard to call it a rebuild when the people brought in to rebuild the team keep getting replaced.

Coaches come with contracts and plans. Then, before these plans had much of a chance to come to fruition, the coach is gone or his authority is curtailed.

A new coach arrives with a new philosophy. Players are selected around that. The roles are changing. The team begins another cycle.

Then comes a bad run of results and the cycle starts again.

The problem isn’t that coaches should never be removed. Sometimes it has to be. The problem is that there seems to be very little continuity.

A coach needs time to understand his players. Players need time to understand what their coach wants. Young cricketers also need some reassurance that a tough few months won’t change the whole structure around them.

Pakistan seems to be operating on a much shorter time frame instead. Lose a streak, change something. Lose another, change something else. Eventually, the changes themselves become the defining feature of the team.

Ironically, Pakistan has already shown what continuity can bring. Under Misbah-ul-Haq, the Test side created a clear identity and reached world number one in 2016.

The contrast with the present is hard to ignore. Reconstruction takes time. Pakistan keeps changing the people who are expected to carry it out.

YOUSUF RAISES LARGER QUESTIONS

Mohammad Yousuf’s intervention made the situation even more uncomfortable as his criticism went beyond selection.

After Pakistan’s batting problems resurfaced in England, Yousuf accused the coaches of not addressing technical deficiencies in Babar Azam and other players when the problems could still be fixed.

“These coaches are poison to the game,” Yousuf wrote, saying they lack vision, block progress and deceive talented players. He said technical flaws that could have been fixed years ago have instead become glaring weaknesses that have been exposed from Bangladesh to England. PCB decided to recall 7 players and even coaches after their disastrous show against England. (Photo: AP)

That’s a damning accusation.

Whether one agrees with Yousuf or not, his central point is hard to ignore. Pakistan has no dearth of talented cricketers. They lack a system that consistently develops this talent and gives it time.

Babar is perhaps the clearest example. A player of his ability has repeatedly sought rhythm and technical assurance in Test cricket. The wider group of batsmen looked equally vulnerable, managing four totals below 200 in the first two Tests against England.

And these are not problems that suddenly appeared in England. It’s just much harder to hide them.

WHO RUNS PAKISTAN CRICKET?

This may be the biggest question of all.

A team can survive a bad coach. It can survive a bad selection call. He can survive even a disastrous tour.

What becomes much harder to survive is a system where responsibility is constantly shifting from one person to another.

When a coach leaves, a new coach takes over. When the results don’t change, the players do. When that doesn’t work, the selectors are challenged. After that, the coaching staff changes again.

At some point it becomes difficult to know who is actually responsible.

Who decided the original lineup? Who supported the players who were sent home? Who named Sarfaraz? Who decided after two tests that he was no longer the right one? And who decided that the answer was to bring in seven new players and one remaining Test?

These questions matter because Pakistan’s latest overhaul was not just a change in selection. It was a mass reaction to the failure, carried out in the middle of the tour.

And the more often these decisions are made, the harder it is to believe that there is a coherent plan behind them.

At the center of this uncertainty sits Mohsin Naqvi, the PCB chairman who also holds one of Pakistan’s most powerful political posts as the country’s interior minister. This dual role has placed him at the very top of the cricketing and political hierarchy, yet Pakistan cricket still seems increasingly driven by noise rather than direction. The Pakistan cricket team has now seen too many chapters of chaos under the Naqvi regime. (Photo: AP)

Under Naqvi, headlines have often been about sweeping changes, dramatic announcements and public posturing, while tougher questions about performance, planning and accountability remain unanswered. The danger is that cricket becomes theatre: lots of movement, lots of news, but very little evidence that the underlying system is actually improving.

NOW EVEN CHAOS IS A JOKE

Perhaps the clearest sign of where Pakistan cricket stands is that former players are no longer critical of the team. They joke about chaos.

Kevin Pietersen mocked the latest uproar by suggesting that the draw should take place the night before to give the captain enough time to explain the squad.

It was a joke. But it landed because the situation itself became almost unbelievable.

Pakistan cricket used to terrify opponents because no one knew what extraordinary thing the team could do next.

Now opponents and observers are asking what extraordinary administrative decision may follow. That’s a real drop.

The talent is still there. The passion is still there. The cricket-mad public is still there. Stability, accountability and a clear long-term vision seem to be lacking.

Pakistan does not need another dramatic reset. Must stop resetting.

Because every time Pakistan cricket seems to have hit rock bottom, along comes another decision that shows there is somehow another floor beneath.

– The end

Issued by:

Debodinna Chakraborty

Published on:

02 Sep 2026 08:28 IST