Wasim Akram: “It is the fault of the entire system and only Babar Azam should not be made a scapegoat out of this”
Image taken by: Bimal Mirwani
Legendary left-arm seamer Wasim Akram made it clear that he doesn’t want to see Babar Azam “made a scapegoat” for Pakistan’s failures as of late.
He noted that while Azam did make mistakes while captaining the team, there were other players who failed to step up and do what was expected of them.
It should be noted that the 29-year-old has been struggling to make big scores and the team’s poor results in the 2023 ICC Cricket World Cup led to him stepping down as captain in all three formats.
“Babar Azam is not the only one playing the match. Yes, he has made mistakes while captaining the side, but he is not the only one that should be blamed. It is the fault of the entire system and only Babar Azam should not be made a scapegoat out of this. Whatever has happened in the past year is the fault of the system,” Wasim said on A Sports as quoted by NDTV.
In the World Cup, Azam rediscovered some consistency as he scored 320 runs in nine matches, which included four fifties, at an average of 40.
Pakistan won their first two games against the Netherlands and Sri Lanka before losing to India, Australia, Afghanistan and South Africa.
Despite fighting back to beat Bangladesh and New Zealand, it was not enough to get them into the semi-finals.
The men in green concluded their campaign in disappointing fashion as England smashed them by 93 runs.
Azam is now representing Pakistan in their three-match Test series against Australia and has scored 77 runs in the first two Tests at an average of 19.25.
Pakistan are 2-0 down in the series and will look to conclude their tour of Australia on a high by claiming a consolation win in the third Test in Sydney, which starts on January 3.
Pakistan Squad for Australia Test Series: Shan Masood (captain), Aamer Jamal, Abdullah Shafique, Abrar Ahmed, Babar Azam, Faheem Ashraf, Hasan Ali, Imam-ul-Haq, Khurram Shahzad, Mir Hamza, Mohammad Rizwan (wk), Mohammad Wasim Jnr, Noman Ali, Saim Ayub, Salman Ali Agha, Sarfaraz Ahmed (wk), Saud Shakeel, Mohammad Nawaz and Shaheen Shah Afridi