Salman Ali Agha was among the seven players sent home during the England tour in August.
Pakistan middle-order batter Salman Ali Agha has publicly called out the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB)'s poor handling of the team, terming the decision to send players home midway through the England tour as "not a good thing."
He emphasized that such drastic mid-series changes negatively affect the confidence of the players and disrupt the environment.
In an indirect reference to PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi, Agha stated clearly that he hopes such mass sackings will not be repeated in the future.
His criticism follows a controversial August 2026 shake-up where seven players—including Agha himself, Mohammad Rizwan, and Imam-ul-Haq—were released from the Test squad following a series-conceding 194-run defeat to England at Lord’s.
“During the series, this (sending players home) has never happened before, and I don’t think it’ll happen again. Dropping players [out of the squad] during the series is not a good thing, and hopefully it won’t happen again," Agha said while speaking at a press conference on the eve of the ODI tri-series final against Sri Lanka.
Salman Ali Agha has since earned a recall to the Test squad following a dominant triple-century in domestic cricket.
However, he firmly believes that players should not be dropped immediately after a failure, as they need adequate time to process, adjust, and overcome their slump.
“You can’t say exactly how many matches it should be," Agha asserted. “But scoring runs in international cricket consistently is not an easy thing. We can only think why players are not scoring runs in every match. But if you are bringing in a youngster or if there’s a senior player who has been performing for a few years, then you should give him a decent number of games. If he fails, at least he needs the time to overcome that failure. They should not be dropped as soon as they fail," he added.