LAHORE: The otherwise cool as cucumber outgoing Pakistan captain Misbah-ul-Haq turned aggressive on Tuesday as he slammed Pakistan’s former cricketers appearing on various TV channels as experts for their ‘slanted views’ about him and the greenshirts.

Addressing a crowded press conference at the Gaddafi Stadium after meeting Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman Shaharyar M Khan, Misbah said he was quite satisfied with his role as captain and he did all he could for Pakistan cricket with honesty and sincerity.

The former ODI captain thanked the PCB for extending him full support throughout his five-year captaincy by ignoring all kind of criticism against him in a section of the media.

The outgoing captain, however, lost his cool when asked to comment on the harsh criticism of his captaincy by former Test cricketers and experts during the World Cup tv shows.

“Media have great responsibility in guiding their viewers. It’s a simple fact that if anyone hires any employee, he considers his training and qualification but unfortunately our media are not following this policy while selecting anchors and experts due to which such kind of unethical languages and behavious are witnessed,” said the veteran batsman with his tone dripping with anger.

“Unfortunately, neither have these cricketers - some of whom have played with us in the past - learnt any ethics at their homes nor at any other institution,” lamented Misbah while stating that such kind of disparaging remarks cannot be heard at any level of broadcasting around the world.

“The world is all praise for your team and players but they (experts and former cricketers) are following a one-point agenda; put all blame on me for anything that goes wrong,” Misbah went on to add. “I am not responsible for every decision because everything was not under my control.”

“How could I be held responsible for problems not related to me? Look, if anything went wrong that was not due to just one person. I did not attack the Sri Lankan team, I am not responsible for refusal of international teams to visit Pakistan or for that matter any other setback Pakistan cricket suffered,” the outgoing ODI captain hit out at his critics.

“I was not in the team which played 2003 and 2007 World Cups. Ask yourselves why Pakistan made exits from the first round of these Cups,” questioned Misbah and advised all those experts appearing on TV channels to think before offering their comments. “What kind of people are they? Instead of disgracing the others they should come up with solutions. And if anyone has been given a chance to comment on TV, they should think a lot before making comments.”

Answering a question, the World Cup captain said he had no plans to withdraw his decision of quitting One-day cricket. “Now Sikandar Bakht (one of his critics) should distribute sweets, for I have no intention to return to the ODIs,” he maintained. “My career as One-day cricketer has ended and now it is the responsibility of youngsters to take care of Pakistan cricket.”

Talking about captaincy and selection issues, Misbah said that the captain and coach should have the authority to select players along with the selectors and they should be equally held responsible for a wrong selection. “Currently, the PCB policy authorises only selectors to have a final say in the affairs of selection while the captain could only give his opinion,” said the outgoing ODI captain who expressed his disappointment at the shambolic performance of Pakistan batsmen during the World Cup.

“In the World Cup, all batsmen failed to click even after making good start and that was unfortunate,” he said.

Taking about decision of testing wicketkeeper-batsman Sarfraz Ahmad after ignoring him in the first four matches, Misbah said: “Sarfraz failed miserably in five matches he played in New Zealand and Australia before the start of the World Cup. So, we decided to go with Nasir Jamshed,” When Nasir failed to click in the early matches, the team management decided to give chance once again to Sarfraz, he added.

“In fact, it was myself and Waqar Younis who had promoted him as opener and at other positions in the last series in the UAE wherein he delivered superbly,” Misbah said who also openly admitted that Pakistan cricketers didn’t match up to the batting and fielding of other top teams in the event.

However, he said the situation was much better in the bowling department. “We could have beaten Australia, but we dropped sitters. Only our bowlers succeeded in creating opportunities for us and they did the same against Aussies but the fielders did not support them,” rued Misbah.

The outgoing captain defended experienced all-rounder Shahid Afridi who failed to deliver throughout the mega event. “We inducted Afridi in all the seven matches, for he is the only genuine all-rounder and because we had no alternative. We were struggling in bowling with four bowlers, so Afridi made for the fifth one,” he said.

Defending his low strike-rate, Misbah said he could not afford going for big shots since at most times the Pakistan batting was in trouble. “Our batting line-up cannot be compared with other teams. If your batsmen are performing you can take risks but as you have seen, whenever I got out quickly, Pakistan could not complete 50 overs,” he stated.

Talking about his Test career, Misbah said he had plans to play Test cricket for sometime but did not know what the PCB had in store for him, adding that he would try to play at least all the series of the current year, starting with Bangladesh and followed by Sri Lanka and India.

When asked if he would suggest any name as his replacement for One-day captaincy to the PCB, Misbah held: “It is a challenge for the PCB to find a new captain now. I want to relax and don’t want to get involved in such complications anymore.”

Published in Dawn, March 25th, 2015

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