Pakistan national cricket team’s red-ball head coach Jason Gillespie has come out to defend white-ball captain Babar Azam, who has been going through a rough patch for a prolonged period of time.
Babar Azam has emerged as Pakistan’s best batsman in the last few years and has played some crucial knocks for his team. The 29-year-old, at one point, was on a record-breaking streak and left the cricket world stunned with his performances.
However, that is now a thing of the past and now, at present, he is struggling to score runs for his team in all three formats. He was expected to be back to his best in the home Test matches against the Bangladesh national cricket team, but that has not been the case and Babar Azam has continued to disappoint his fans across the world.
In the first Test on a batting-friendly Rawalpindi track, Babar Azam returned with scores of 0 and 22 and faced harsh criticism. Moreover, things did not change for him in the second Test at the same venue as he registered scores of 31 and 11.
In Tests, he has gone 16 innings without reaching a fifty and overall since January 2023, Babar Azam has scored just 317 runs in eight Tests at an average of 21.13, his best score being 41.
Babar Azam’s recent failures have had a direct impact on the Pakistan National Cricket Team’s performance in international cricket as they have struggled to get off the ground and have performed extremely poorly in multinational tournaments.
Despite all these difficulties, Jason Gillespie has shown faith in Babar Azam, calling him a world-class player. Gillespie also expressed confidence that the 29-year-old will be back to his best very soon.
“Babar is a quality player and he has started a couple of games. Like a lot of our players, he hasn’t been able to convert his starts. But Babar is a world-class player and he’s very close to being one, I feel that. I’m very confident that we’ll see Babar score big runs very soon. He’s a very good player and I look forward to seeing him do well,” Jason Gillespie said at the post-match press conference.
Obviously, there are some things we were hoping Shaheen could work on – Jason Gillespie
Babar Azam is not the only Pakistan star who is going through a tough time as pacer Shaheen Afridi has also been out of form. He was dropped from the starting XI for the second Test after taking just 2 wickets in the first Test, that too after Pakistan had bowled over 160 overs.
Meanwhile, Jason Gillespie expressed his confidence in Shaheen Afridi’s abilities and revealed that the pacer has been told to work on a few things and hopes he returns to his best.
“Obviously there are a few things that we were hoping Shaheen would be able to work on. Obviously he’s had a very hectic time in his personal life as well. So, taking all that into account, we want Shaheen Afridi to be at his best to play as much cricket as possible,” Gillespie said.
“He’s a player who plays in all formats and we have a very tight schedule. We have to make sure he is fit and in top form and that he is bowling at the highest level so that he can play as many games as possible for Pakistan,” Gillespie added.
