Captain, VC, Selectors and Coach Bite the Dust

New Captain
By SS
March 19 2003

It was time once again for complete change as the PCB made sweeping changes, after the pathetic display in the World Cup. Rashid Latif will work alonside Javed Miandad and Aamir Sohail will chair the selection committee.

The game of musical chairs continues in Pakistani cricket, with more or less the same names coming back for another slice of pie.

Rashid Latif was today named as captain of the Pakistani team and given that he is 34 years old and was ready for retirement, it appears to be a short term measure rather than looking ahead to the future. Rashid’s previous tenure as captain hardly covered him in glory in 1998 on the tours to Bangladesh, South Africa and Zimbabwe, before he was removed by the Board.

Rashid it appears has been brought in on the insistence of Javed Miandad, who has once again been brought as coach to rescue our crumbling and lacklustre team. Rashids right hand man is probably the biggest surprise and that is Yousuf Youhana, who has never seriously in the eyes of most fans been considered as a future captain. Will this appointment be similar to the Inzamam appointment, once again a vice captain who was never really going to make it as captain. One would hope that the Inzamam as vice captain, lesson has been learnt by the PCB, but based on the appointment of Youhana, I dont think it has.

Aamir Sohail, the outspoken and controversial leftie has been drafted in as Chairman of Selectors and will sit alongside Shoaib Muhammad, Farukh Zaman and Shafiq Ahmed on the Selection Committee. It appears that if you talk a good game in the commentary box, this gives you the necessary qualifications for a major role in the set up of Pakistani cricket.

What do todays appointments mean for the future of Pakistani cricket? Well for starters, as mentioned previously, Javed Miandad is currently the key man, as most, if not all todays appointments will have been made on the insistence of Mr Miandad. Going forward, I would be very surprised to see Wasim Akram continuing, Waqar Younis will probably be forced into early retirement too and Shahid Afridi will probably never be selected whilst Aamir Sohail has any say in matters, although Saeed Anwar will be asked to continue opening the batting.

I think the Miandad, Latif and Sohail trio will opt to play a number of youngsters in Sharjah just to give them a chance and see if they have the makings of becoming future stars.

What I, and probably most fans want to see though is the discipline, the fight and the hunger to win being instilled once again into the team and Miandad can do this, providing he has a group of players that are willing to learn from him.

Remember though, Pakistani cricket is a rollercoaster with lots of twists, turns and bumps along the way. Expect to see some unusual scenarios and possibly some surprises in the coming months.