Former Pakistan cricketer Atiq-uz-Zaman questioned interim white-ball head coach Aqib Javed over Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan’s reinstation as the openers in the T20I team.
Chasing a daunting 184-run in the first T20I against South Africa on Tuesday, Pakistan opened the run chase through their established pair of Babar and Rizwan, which resulted in the demotion of Saim Ayub to number three, followed by Usman Khan at four.
The pair, however, did not prove to be beneficial for the touring side as it gave a sloppy 16-run start, which culminated with star batter Babar perishing for a four-ball duck in the third over.
“Didn’t Aqib Javed sahab himself say Babar & Rizwan are fine for 150-160 but not 180+? And now, under his coaching, they’re still opening in a 180+ chase,” Atiq questioned in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
Notably, Aqib has previously voiced strong criticism against the opening pair of Babar and Rizwan and claimed that the duo is only effective for chasing scores ranging from 150-160.
"Our only mindset is to persist with these two openers and rely on them. They are effective, but where? When you have to chase a score of 150-160 or lower. When we have a match with Karachi Kings and the total if 180+, we never really tried or wished to get Babar Azam out early. He bats at his own pace and then required run rate keeps rising. Mohammad Rizwan also did well in PSL but when these two bat together, you see similar performances from them," Aqib had said in 2022.
- Babar Azam
- Mohammad Rizwan
