Ramiz Raja On Babar Azam Poor Form: Former Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) Chairman and national team player Ramiz Raja reckons that the discourse around Babar Azam’s form is there purely because of his form and that the people should focus more on the reasons behind a loss.
The Men in Green have had a humiliating few months. First, in the 2024 T20 World Cup, they were defeated by the USA and were thus eliminated in the first round as the United States went on through to the Super 8.
More recently, the Test team captained by Shan Masood lost to Bangladesh for the first time in the format, that too at home and by a massive margin of 10 wickets.
The loss against Bangladesh is especially disappointing, seeing how Pakistan declared in the first inning. The Bangla Tigers won the toss and chose to field first, so the home team notched up 448/6 before declaring as Saud Shakeel and Mohammad Rizwan scored centuries. In response, Najmul Hasan Shanto’s men scored 565 runs, with Mushfiqur Rahim scoring 191.
With the pitch slowing down on the final day, Pakistan were dismissed for 146, leaving a 30-run target in the final inning for the visitors, which they reached without losing a wicket.
This loss exposed a lot of issues with the Pakistan Cricket Team. But a concern that has been persisting for a few months now is the form of star-batter Babar Azam. The former captain scored a combined 22 runs against Bangladesh, which included a duck in the first inning.
Over the last two years, Babar’s Test average has been just over 31, which is way sub-par. Since the start of 2023, he has not scored a half-century in the format in seven games.
Ramiz Raja On Babar Azam Poor Form
While Azam’s form is a concern and is being seen as such by the Pakistani media, Ramiz Raja believes that the issue of Babar’s form has been blown out of proportion. Speaking on the topic on his YouTube channel, Raja said that the former skipper’s form is in the headlines purely because of his popularity.
“It seems the entire nation doesn’t have a problem with anything except the form of Babar Azam. Unfortunately, what happens is when you lose a match and you haven’t scored runs, and if you are Babar Azam, then you become a headline: How did we lose? What did he do? What was his contribution? And then this is the era of social media. Anybody can criticize and ridicule anyone; this should be discouraged as much as possible,” he said.
Ramiz went on to suggest that cricket’s popularity in the country might decline if the national team continues to lose such matches, saying,
“Cricket is in our blood, but don’t know for how long if we continue to lose matches like this in Test cricket. Fan following increases with wins, and fans identify themselves with success stories. Babar Azam has had a famous success story. There is no doubt that he has been a big player in all three formats.”
The second Pakistan vs Bangladesh Test match will be played in the Rawalpindi Cricket Stadium and will commence on August 30.
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