Salman Butt: “I think that Imam must be feeling very hard done [by], especially when he was told that his intent was not right in the Australia series”
Image taken by: Bimal Mirwani
Former Pakistan captain Salman Butt believes opening batsman Imam-ul-Haq must be feeling like he is the victim of unfair treatment after being dropped for the ongoing two-match Test series against Bangladesh.
The 28-year-old’s form in his last few Tests had been iffy, but it is believed that Saim Ayub was preferred over him due to his more aggressive style of batting.
Salman noted Imam “was told that his intent was not right”, but the Lahore native was not given a long enough opportunity to adopt a different approach as he was subsequently removed from the playing XI.
“I think that Imam must be feeling very hard done [by], especially when he was told that his intent was not right in the Australia series,” he said on his YouTube channel as quoted by Cricket Pakistan.
“And those who said that, they have nothing to do with cricket. But someone must have told him [what] to say, someone must have assigned him on duty, someone must have told him that you talk to him (Imam). And the people who play cricket, I don’t know why they hesitate.”
Imam was not involved in the 2024 T20 World Cup, where the men in green failed to make it out of the group stage.
Pakistan are 1-0 down in the Test series against Bangladesh after losing the first Test by 10 wickets.
The second Test began on August 30 in Rawalpindi.
Pakistan Squad for Bangladesh Test Series: Shan Masood (captain), Saud Shakeel (vice-captain), Aamer Jamal, 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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