The PCB should realize that there’s a limit to what a coach can do to better his team’s fortunes
NO sooner have we lost a rubber that the warrants are out on Javed Miandad. There is the assertion that he does not use technology, nor has he mastered the art of communication and does not know how to sit quietly whether in rejoicing or frustration.
Fair enough observation and indeed carrying much merit. But why is it that such warnings are not issued when the side is winning?
It was Winston Churchill who continued to warn Europe and his own beloved England to prepare for war when his own government and the entire continent was advocating peace with Hitler and signing the treaties. Javed, it must be accepted, kept warning both administrations that times would be tough ahead if they didn’t inculcate team discipline, and neither can deny it because if Miandad can say it to countless people, he must have been saying it to the PCB.
Likewise if the problem is of personality and lack of technical knowledge, why didn’t people like Abdul Qadir hold court for the media last year and warn of times to come? How come that with the same limitations which are unsuitable for a coach, Javed guided young cricketers through Test series victories this past winter?
True Rashid Latif played a huge role in moulding the team and making the young players mentally strong. But it cannot be said with certainty that Miandad played no role. Maybe a lesser role, but clearly an important one in fine tuning techniques. Both Taufeeq and Yasir Hameed have improved since last May.
The fact that Miandad continues to come forward every time there is a crisis shows just how much love for country and cricket he has. He doesn’t need this day-to-day tirade against him. He’s made enough money to retire and run his own academy.
But Miandad has always wanted the job. He knew in 1998 that he was up against Wasim and Co. who had manoeuvred him out of the national side. And yet he chose to contribute in what would always be seen as their success. He said YES again when Tauqir Zia asked him to return later the same year to manage a side that had lost a Test series at home for the fourth year in a row. He took his sacking with his chin up the following year because the measures he had suggested for improvement in the side were thrown at his face. There were no guts in the PCB at the time to go for rebuilding; they let the cancer in and showed Miandad the door.
Over the past week or so, people have been asking for his head. He has been pulled up for not stopping the wides and no-balls and lack of commitment on the field. So if he is supposedly responsible for being the brains behind the bowling and batting, he should be considered the architect of our Test series wins against South Africa at home and on tour in New Zealand, two of the toughest sides of the past three years.
Within weeks of being appointed coach we had, minus six of the World Cup squad, beaten England and Sri Lanka on their home turfs. So should we not say he masterminded the planning on alien fields? Let us then give him the credit for Yasir’s two hundreds on Test debut. In New Zealand he must be credited for the incisive bursts of Sami and Shoaib and the match saving inning by Moin in the first Test and for the discipline with which Inzamam and Youhana batted to win the second.
And if the current loss is being saddled on his inadequacies, then of course he should be regarded as the brains behind Pakistan’s victories at Chennai and Kolkata in early 1999 when he was first appointed coach. Winning a Test in India was only achieved twice before in six attempts, and never two on the same tour.
And if that credit cannot be shared with him then let’s not point to him when our bowlers bowl buckets full of extra balls and drop catches and the batsmen lack application. Let’s not ask him to resign simply because he utters in frustration that players are not listening to him. So which coach and manager have the Pakistani team members, especially over the last ten years, ever listened to? And who will they listen to now and why? Wasn’t Imran pulling his hair near the end of the 1989-90 tour of Australia?
John Buchanan, Australia’s coach for the last few years, actually wrote a memo to the players after the Australians collapsed in the second innings of the Adelaide Test and allowed India to win from a hopeless situation. He castigated in writing his entire team for lack of application and giving more attention to off-field sponsorship activities than to the cricket. The whole cricket board backed him even though this was a rare blemish from the juggernauts of the past five years.
Why on earth are we criticizing a coach for not ‘teaching’ bowlers who have been playing for several years now and have over 100 representations? Are we to believe that Shoaib Akhtar and Sami have to be taught the basics of run-up and seam control every morning? And that after taking catches for over a decade Sami and Saqlain and Imran Farhat were overlooked for refresher courses by the coach upon reaching Multan?
So is then that John Buchanan spends all his time marking out bowling run ups for Bret Lee and John Gillespie and making new discoveries every week about how a skier can be grasped through a new technique?
Every person in this country is smart enough to think for himself but very, very few have the training or the data to make informed decisions. Majority is carried away by emotions emanated through the media and seeks simple solutions because they want results. And if they don’t mind the loss when it has been hard fought for then there was always the Karachi ODI.
By focusing on the cricketers and coach we are yet again missing the point. We have no specialist coach at school, college or even university level. There are neither any internationally qualified coaches at first-class level. All ‘coaches’ are self made, passing on what tips they picked up while playing.
We produced batsmen in the seventies partly because there were coaches like Abdur Rabb at Lahore and ‘Master’ Aziz at Karachi and partly because of the pitches. But we were beaten in England and Australia at the time because they had coaching as an institution and not based on guardian angels.
We won in the eighties because of Imran and Miandad, where our playing eleven equaled 14 because of these two phenomenally talented men. But their key was hardwork. Missing today are such men and such hard work. Players are therefore coming up through sheer talent but have hardly any clue to strategic thinking and mental discipline. As it is the community, family and friends of fledgling cricketers rocket their egos sky-high and there is always a benefactor at political or institutional level. Fear of being dropped and therefore losing lakhs of rupees in match fees and sponsorship packages makes them frustrated and trust their instincts rather than commit to a long term plan which may get them dropped from matches and subsequent riches.
The PCB top management believes you can’t run a team if you complain too much. Maddening isn’t it then, that they themselves keep talking in the media that they are looking for more coaches and inform that match winning cricketers will be checked to see if they have lied. Why is it that the administration is not answerable for the same rule that the coaches and cricketers are responsible for?
Accepted that Miandad is reportedly not a good communicator. But then, the Board isn’t either sending him on a course in man-management and interpersonal skills. Even CEOs in major multinationals attend these regularly but what is the PCB doing on these lines? Guest lecturers have not the same effect as specialized courses in institutions.
Miandad must now be positioned as only a coach and not the famed cricketer of the past. He will be judged by youngsters on the basis of how he interacts with them today.
