Re: Afridi an 'absolutely clueless' captain - team manager
I may agree that Afridi is not playing best cricket of his life but if I see the recent matches, AFRIDI is man of the match in most of the outings that had favorable results for Pakistan. If Afridi didn't perform against Bangladesh in T20 World Cup, we would have been whitewashed in the tournament. Furthermore, We expect Afridi to perform in every match though, we made him a glamour and then we complain about his glamorous attitude. Meanwhile, we praise Maxwell, Morgan, Gayle type players who also usually don't perform regularly but they still play because their team knows they are the match winners and can change the course of the match in handful of balls. They can afford to do that because the other 10 players also understand their responsibilities. Also, their coaching staff works very hard on their batsmen, reducing their mistakes and groom them unlike our team.
Afridi won us the T20 World Cup 2009 and have numerous records for Pakistan. I am not a blind fan of Afridi but you cannot deny the fact that He produced most match winning performances in last 2 decades and that's the reason he find the place in the team. Players like don't born everyday. People say if Afridi was in Australia or England, He would have not played more than a year, but I disagree. They wouldn't have left Afridi on his own, Maxwell is a big example. He was just a slog hitter with poor batting technique and look at him now.
We are heavily dependent on AFRIDI and that's the reason the other ten players gets away without performing well. As far as the captaincy is concerned. I don't think even M Clarke or B McCullum could have won us any matches we lost in the world cup. Our batsmen lack temperament, they have poor technique, they don't know how to convert 50s into 100s or even somewhere 70 to 80 odds, they get plumb in straighter one is a turning track, they struggle against out swing, play with negative mindset, poor running and strike rotations to name a few problems. What can a captain do anything about that? Our bowling is not as good as it used to be. Amir, alone, cannot win us all the matches. T20 cricket is changed, batsmen have wide variety of shots, the bowlers need to be smart and skillful, our short pitch mantra won't work even if we bring 9'1 tall bowler batsmen will find a way to beat them. We need T20 specialists bowlers. We don't have Ajmal anymore and we have to get over it.
I wish they learn from their past mistakes and play good cricket in England. Conditions will be tough but with good training, practice and strategy, they can definitely give a tough time to England.