Pakistan Director of Cricket Mickey Arthur spoke about the Men in Green poor showing in the recent ICC World Cup 2023 as they finished the tournament with a loss to England in Kolkata on November 11.
Pakistan managed to win just 4 games in the tournament against Netherlands, Sri Lanka, New Zealand (via DLS), and Bangladesh. They were handed sound defeats by India, Australia, South Africa, England, and Afghanistan.
Captain Babar Azam failed to score a century in the tournament, while their fastest bowler Haris Rauf gave more than 500 runs in the tournament and was hit for most sixes as well.
However, in the post-match conference after the England tie, Arthur still backed Babar Azam to do well as captain. He said that Babar Azam is a young man on a steep learning curve and someone, who needs to be handheld.
"We were a real tight-knit unit. I get behind Babar. Babar is very, very close to me. He's a young guy that needs to be taken on the journey with him. He needs to be shown the ropes. He's still learning all the time. We know he's a very, very fine batsman. He learns every day with his captaincy. He's growing and we have to allow him the time to grow. And to do that, you (have to allow him to) make mistakes," Arthur said at the post-match conference.
"It's not a crime to make mistakes as long as you learn from those mistakes and as a group, we've made a lot of mistakes this World Cup but if this group grows and learns from it, we've got the core of a very, very good side.
There's always outside noise, whatever World Cup you are at there's outside noise. The key for us as leaders within that group is to make sure that we make the players deaf to that outside noise. As I say, for us as a group and us as a team, particularly for us as leaders, we've got to create a stable environment," he added.
He further talked about the absence of Naseem Shah and said that this hurt the equilibrium of the bowling attack.
"Our bowling equilibrium was out of kilter because Naseem Shah provides the consistency, whereas it allows Shaheen Shah to attack, and then you can attack with your leg spinner and you attack with Haris Rauf. So, the equilibrium was upset but that is no excuse at all because quite frankly we haven't played well enough. We haven't bowled well enough at times,” he added.
"Batting-wise, we have to become a 330-350 team. Our game needs to go to another level. The teams that are doing that and doing that consistently are the teams that are in the semi-final. And I don't think we've done that consistently enough. We do that when Fakhar Zaman comes off and we can't just be relying on one player," he said.
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Talking about his future, Mickey Arthur said that he’d be happy to go back to England and be the coach of Derbyshire.
Asked if he's ready to face the consequences, Arthur said: "Yeah, look, I'll just go back to Derbyshire, I'll be really happy and that'll be okay." "But I came in to do this job, obviously in conjunction with Derbyshire because I care a hell of a lot for the Pakistan dressing room.
I care for Pakistan cricket. Pakistan cricket is very close to my heart, and that was the reason that when Mr. Sethi came calling, I did it, was because I want to give stability, I want to give structure, I want the players to be able to grow up in an environment that's consistent and stable, outside of all the ramblings and the noise that goes on. We owe it to those players.”
(PTI Inputs)
