Zain Abbas: “If you look at his career overall, the whole world is praising him and we are criticising him”
Image taken by: Bimal Mirwani
Pakistan batsman Zain Abbas expressed his disappointment at the fact that limited overs captain Babar Azam gets criticised by Pakistanis when he is praised by the rest of the world.
The 32-year-old noted that Azam has achieved so much in his international career, much more in fact than many other ex-players who lambast him for his performances and captaincy.
Considering the fact that the 29-year-old has been Pakistan’s most consistent run-scorer in all three formats for the past few years, Abbas feels all the condemnation coming his way is not warranted.
“If you talk about Babar Azam’s performances, you are talking about only a few matches of him in ICC tournaments. If you look at his career overall, the whole world is praising him and we are criticising him. Similarly, there is Rizwan. Make them captain, then you remove them,” he told PakPassion.
“How many Pakistani captains have played two finals of World Cups? Not being able to win is another debate, but Babar played two finals in World Cups. All the ex-cricketers that are sitting out there, our team got out in the first round during their time. How can you criticise Babar on social media? The ex-cricketers just criticising you [in] the media. He is averaging 50, being a cricketer you should know it is not everyone’s cup of tea that you are averaging 50 in all formats.”
Azam recently captained the men in green in the 2024 T20 World Cup and was the team’s highest run-scorer with 122 runs in four matches at an average of 40.66 and a strike-rate of 101.66.
Next up for Azam will be Pakistan’s two-Test series against Bangladesh, which will be held in Rawalpindi and Karachi from August 21 to September 3.
Pakistan Squad for Bangladesh Test Series: Shan Masood (captain), Saud Shakeel (vice-captain), Aamer Jamal (subject to fitness), Abdullah Shafique, Abrar Ahmed, Babar Azam, Kamran Ghulam, Khurram Shahzad, Mir Hamza, Mohammad Ali, Muhammad Hurraira, Mohammad Rizwan (wicketkeeper), Naseem Shah, Saim Ayub, Salman Ali Agha, Sarfaraz Ahmed (wicketkeeper), Shaheen Shah Afridi
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