A host of former cricketers of Pakistan including ex-skipper Ramiz Raja are heaping criticism on their country’s team management questioning why it is relying on ‘veterans’ (older cricketers) in the team, and, that too, in T20 format. But the Pakistani cricketers are responding to critics with their performance.
Take Mohammad Hafeez for instance. He played a quickfire knock of 69 runs off 36 balls, studded with four sixes and five fours in the second T20I against England. He had kindled Pakistan’s hope of a victory at one point of time in the match. In the last two years, Hafeez has had an impressive average of 90 runs per innings. In the next few months, Hafeez will turn 40.
Likewise, the performance of Shoaib Malik, particularly against England, has been excellent. Malik is also just one year younger than Hafeez. Malik has a good batting record on foreign soil and he plays without any pressure. With his 49-run innings in Capetown and a half-century against Bangladesh, Malik has proved that the team management has a solid reason to rely on him. Both Hafeez and Malik are part-time bowlers too. Both of them even prove to be better than younger players while performing in the area of fielding. Misbah-ulHaq and T20 team skipper Babar Azam rely on both of them.
Who can forget James Anderson? At the age of 38, Anderson gave such a performance that no pacer in cricket history might have performed like him to date. When he crossed the 600-wicket mark in a match of his Test career against Pakistan, he said that his next target was to complete 700 wickets. It shows he is a great fast bowler of the present age, who takes five-wicket haul in just one inning at this age also. When he was seen struggling to take a wicket against West Indies, he seemed to be upset. But soon, he compensated for it in the series against Pakistan.
South African Faf du Plessis is also past 36. He has made a century in a one-day match recently against a strong team like Australia. In another match before this, he had played an inning of 96 runs and remained not out. He is an asset to the South Africa team. Team India’s Wriddhiman Saha is one of the top wicketkeepers in the world, but there is a pressure on him for batting aggressively, due to which he may have to lose his place in the team in the future. Sri Lankan spinner Dilruwan Perera, who has crossed 38 years of age, gave a good performance against England and South Africa and did not allow his age to affect his game.
Now the question is as to who will give chance to young cricketers to play in the teams. There are some players such as Zak Crawley of the England Test team, David Malan of the England One Day team, Australian Marnus Labuschagne, and West Indian Oshaine Thomas, who have shown in their young age that they will grow into big players in the future. These youngsters do perform well but in patches.
What happens is that the future team is prepared at the cost of the present team. The better way will be that some of these youngsters should be given chances with seniors so that the team’s performance does not get affected. Like, Pakistan had given Haris Rauf a chance to play in T20 against England. But Haider Ali, who had given remarkable performance in Pakistan Super League and Under-19, is out of the team at the moment. But the possibility is that he will be taken in soon. At the same time, the team management of Pakistan will be questioned if performance is not up to the mark. Therefore, if Pakistan could not level the T20 series in the match against England to be held on 1 September, then questions will arise. A logic being put forward is that the T20 World Cup has been deferred for a year. In such a situation, there is a risk of reflexes of older players getting much weaker. But the youngsters who will be playing with them will also be watched out for their performance, and their skill to face the international pressure.
This is also a reality that the teams like Sri Lanka, West Indies, and Bangladesh do not presently have the same talent which they used to have several years ago. Hence, these teams are managing with the players who are playing for the last ten years and who are seen as relatively older players whose reflexes are weak.
It is also a fact that these teams are getting new talents. They should be groomed in the presence of senior players. England is the only team in the world that does not keep any cricketer of tests in the T20 squad. But England is an exception. Hopefully, several teams will have new players joining in and youngsters will be seen playing for them in the next two to three years.