Junaid Khan: “he had hardly played any domestic games and his performance on that tour wasn’t that great, so that could affect him going forward and damage his confidence”
Image courtesy of: ESPNcricinfo
Pakistan left-arm seamer Junaid Khan believes that fellow seamer Muhammad Musa may have damaged his confidence following his international debut.
Musa debuted during Pakistan’s tour of Australia last year and played in one Test and a T20 International.
However, he went wicketless in both matches, which Junaid pointed out “could affect him going forward”.
Junaid also suggested that Musa was too inexperienced to play international cricket and has no one to seek advice from in the Pakistan team as many of the other fast bowlers are in the same boat as him since they too haven’t played many matches for Pakistan.
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“There is a huge difference between exposing an untried young bowler to a T20I compared to a Test match,” he told PakPassion. “The reason is that in a T20 game, bowlers are expected to be hit about so if they do go for runs, the mental impact isn’t that great. However, in a Test match, the situation is different for a young bowler and he will struggle if he doesn’t have enough First-Class experience under his belt.
“If we take the example of Musa who debuted for Pakistan in Australia, he had hardly played any domestic games and his performance on that tour wasn’t that great, so that could affect him going forward and damage his confidence.
“On top of that, a young bowler also needs guidance when he is new. If I look back at my own career, I was initially part of an experienced squad which had the likes of Umar Gul and Mohammad Sami and these bowlers were able to guide and help me when and if I was making any mistakes.
“In contrast, today’s Pakistan Test side, we struggle to find bowlers who have played even 30 Tests so who can a young bowler bank upon for advice? Mohammad Abbas is the senior-most bowler in the Pakistan Test side and he has just 18 matches to his name which shows the extent of the problem we are facing today.”
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