File photo of former Pakistan captain Salman Butt© AFP
Former Pakistan captain Salman Butt has slammed the Pakistan Cricket Board for preparing flat tracks at home. Butt, was asked about Babar Azam’s captaincy skills by the anchor on his YouTube channel. Butt praised Babar for his recent successes but said that a captain’s skills are honed in Test cricket. He then went on to criticise the board for preparing tracks which does not allow a captain to strategise and go for a win. Pakistan earlier this year lost at home to Australia and the pitches used for the Test matches came in for a lot of criticism.
“Babar has been captaining for a while now and he has achieved success in the home series against Australia and the team did well in the T20 World Cup last year too. He will improve with time.
“A captain’s skills and tactical ability is visible more in Test cricket and ODIs, which we play very less. Test cricket gives the best chance to see a captain’s ability but the kind of pitches we make at home, it takes everything away from a captain in terms of strategy.
“You can look at the pitch and say that spinners will play. A result is difficult to achieve even till the fifth day. One has to wait till the end to see if the pitch breaks. This doesn’t test a captain’s skill.
“To do that go and win in England. Or give tougher teams a run for their money. Pakistan has lost away from home in the past too but we would win matches,” Butt said.
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He went on to add that to win Test matches a captain needs a good bowling attack and although Pakistan has good bowlers, Butt felt that they needed more experience to start winning consistently away from home.
“You can’t put the onus on the captain. Babar has a good attack but the bowlers are inexperienced and they haven’t played a lot of first-class cricket. Shaheen is a world class talent but he also needs to gain more experienced. The same is the case with spinners. We don’t have a spinner who can run through a batting order,” Butt added.
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