Mohammad Asif: “I rate [him] highly, he is one of the best batters in the country but he plays dots in the powerplay and puts pressure on Rizwan”
Image taken by: Bimal Mirwani
Former Pakistan fast bowler Mohammad Asif has accused former captain Babar Azam of putting pressure on wicketkeeper-batsman Mohammad Rizwan by playing too many dot balls.
Azam and Rizwan open the batting for Pakistan in T20Is and are the most consistent run-scorers in the format.
However, Asif feels that the 29-year-old bats too slow, which puts Rizwan under the pump to up the scoring rate.
“I rate [him] highly, he is one of the best batters in the country but he plays dots in the powerplay and puts pressure on Rizwan,” he said in a space session on X, formerly known as Twitter, as quoted by Cricket Pakistan.
Both Azam and Rizwan recently played in the 2023 ICC Cricket World Cup, with the former having scored 320 runs in nine matches, which included four fifties, at an average of 40.
As for Rizwan, he amassed 395 runs in nine games, which included a hundred and a half-century, at an average of 65.83.
Pakistan won their first two World Cup matches against the Netherlands and Sri Lanka before stumbling in their next four games against India, Australia, Afghanistan and South Africa.
They managed to end their downward spiral with wins over Bangladesh and New Zealand.
However, they failed to make it to the semi-finals and to add insult to injury, they lost their last group stage match against England by 93 runs.
Pakistan Squad for 2023 ICC Cricket World Cup: Fakhar Zaman, Imam-ul-Haq, Abdullah Shafique, Babar Azam (capt), Mohammad Rizwan, Saud Shakeel, Iftikhar Ahmed, Salman Ali Agha, Shadab Khan, Usama Mir, Mohammad Nawaz, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Haris Rauf, Mohammad Wasim Jnr, Hasan Ali
[TS_Poll id=”100″]
Look who’s saying mr fixer