Rashid Latif: “You could have taken Mehran Mumtaz, just to give him experience”
Image taken by: Bimal Mirwani
Rashid Latif, the former wicketkeeper-batsman, has urged the Pakistan selectors to consider selecting promising left-arm spinner Mehran Mumtaz in the Test team.
The 20-year-old from Rawalpindi recently played for the Pakistan Shaheens and Pakistan A, during which he showed plenty of potential.
In the Pakistan Shaheens’ first four-day games against Zimbabwe in May 2023, Mumtaz took five wickets in the first innings and six more in the second innings, which led to him finishing the match with 11 wickets to his name.
Currently, he is playing for Rawalpindi Region in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, which is Pakistan’s first-class competition.
Given how young he is and how well he has been performing, Latif feels Mumtaz would benefit by being around the Test team and learning from Pakistan’s senior players.
“You could have taken Mehran Mumtaz, just to give him experience,” he said on his YouTube channel as quoted by Cricket Pakistan.
Pakistan have been in red-hot form as of late as they beat Sri Lanka 2-0 in a Test series before securing a 3-0 ODI series win over Afghanistan.
The men in green recently played in the Asia Cup, where they started their campaign with a brutal 238-run win over Nepal.
They then had to share one point apiece with India as their match was rained off after the men in blue scored 266 in their innings.
Having qualified for the Super Fours, Pakistan continued to impress as they recorded a clinical seven-wicket victory over Bangladesh in Lahore.
Everything went wrong from here for the men in green as India thumped them by 228 runs.
They still had a chance to reach the Asia Cup final, but lost to Sri Lanka by two wickets via the Duckworth–Lewis–Stern method (DLS) method.
Pakistan Squad for 2023 Asia Cup: Babar Azam (capt), Shadab Khan, Mohammad Rizwan (wk), Saud Shakeel, Fakhar Zaman, Abdullah Shafique, Imam-ul-Haq, Saud Shakeel, Salman Ali Agha, Iftikhar Ahmed, Mohammad Nawaz, Usama Mir, Haris Rauf, Naseem Shah, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Mohammad Haris (wk), Faheem Ashraf, Mohammad Wasim Jnr, Shahnawaz Dahani, Zaman Khan.
Travelling reserve: Tayyab Tahir