LAHORE: Director National Cricket Academy (NCA) and former Test all-rounder Mudassar Nazar on Monday hailed world record maker Abid Ali’s feat in the Rawalpindi Test and said the opener has a lot of talent and should have played for Pakistan a couple of years ago.

In an exclusive interview with Dawn, Mudassar also stressed on the importance of club cricket and said it is the basis of excellence in Australian cricket and Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) will now be following the same model to produce high class players.

“Last year, Abid represented Pakistan ‘A’ team against England Lions in the UAE and he scored brilliantly. I saw him batting and was very impressed and recommended in my report that Abid should play for Pakistan,” recalled the former opener. “Yes Abid has been scoring at the domestic level for many years and the way he was performing he should have played for Pakistan a couple of years back. But he was unlucky because two regular openers at that time were also playing well.”

On Sunday, Abid became the first batsman in the entire cricket history to score a century on his Test and One-day International debut when when he hit 109 in the rain-hit first Test against Sri Lanka in Rawalpindi. Earlier, he had scored a century against Australia in Dubai this year in his first ODI.

‘Revival of club cricket only way forward for our cricket’

“Both Abid and Nasim Shah were recommended by the selectors to NCA for overcoming their fitness problems,” recalled Mudassar. “Both the players got treatment at the NCA but Abid was not considered as fully fit by the selectors compared to other cricketers, despite the fact that he was scoring in abundance,” he said. “Both Nasim and Abid did lot of hard work at the NCA and now they are absolutely fit by grace of God. I foresee a bright future for both the players.”

He also predicted that upcoming talented batsmen Rohail Nazir and Hyder Ali were also in line to make debut for in international cricket very soon as no one could stop their entry in the national team.

Mudassar further said that head coach and chief selector Misbah-ul-Haq had visited the NCA where Musa Khan, Nasim Shah and other talented cricketers were examined before they were selected for the Australia tour.

Asked if there was any proper system in place to ensure talented players like Abid are not ignored in the future, Mudassar said the selection committee was the best forum to address this issue.

To a question, Mudassar said that club system should be revived at all cost if Pakistan wants to produce talented cricketers in the years to come. “Though NCA is a platform where the talented cricketers are polished, the real role of spotting and grooming raw talent rests with the club and district/regional bodies and it is a challenge for us to promote club cricket.

“The new system of the PCB, based on six provincial teams, is being introduced in the country on Cricket Australia’s pattern. But strong club cricket is the back-bone of Australian cricket and we have to provide better equipments and infrastructure at the club level to make the new system work,” he opined.

“Local cricket association, club’s owners and the PCB have to invest jointly on revival of club cricket. But the PCB alone cannot meet all the expense of providing top class equipment and infrastructure on its own,” he said. “Honest and efficient people should be elected at the grassroots level to generate funds at their own level to boost club cricket.”

However, when reminded that currently the PCB had banned the club cricket for the last five months in order to implement its new system based on provincial and city level, Mudassar said the PCB was trying to streamline the new system and it was trying to get sponsors for the grassroots cricket, so it is taking time.

Interestingly, Mudassar was tight-lipped when asked if the current ban on club cricket could damage the game at the grassroots level.

He suggested that from the club level, teams ranging from under-9, 10, 11,12, to 19 years should be formed as Cricket Australia do in their system.

Mudassar said he had introduced U-13 cricket and had he stayed further, he would have also started cricket from Under-9 level.

Answering a thorny question about the reason behind his decision to announce his departure from director academies’ post six months in advance, Mudassar said when he joined ICC Academy in Dubai, he was not interested to return to Pakistan but previous PCB chairman Shaharyar M Khan brought him back with the promise that funds would be available to build cricket centers in different cities.

“I tried my best to streamline the affairs of the NCA but now I want to live with my family in England where I may do my own business or cricket coaching on part-time basis,” he disclosed. “As far as informing the PCB about my decision six months before the expiry of my contract, I feel it is not a bad thing as it will give the PCB enough time to get my replacement.”

To a question that whether the decisions in appointing coaches of the six provincial teams of first and second XI were made on merit, Mudassar said though his input was also there but Misbah as head coach and chief selector was the major person in making the appointments.

“There might be some controversial decisions in appointing the coaches but it is not an easy job to make such appointments,” he commented.

Mudassar also pointed out that the NCA had no deep coordination with PCB’s bio-mechanics lab which is set up at a private university and is working independently.

“Few cases of bowlers having illegal bowling actions were recommended to the bio-mechanics lab, but for the last five to six months not a single case has been sent. They are working independently as the PCB signed an MoU with the private university before I joined the NCA,” Mudassar said.

It may be mentioned that all the investment on buying and installing the labs was made by the PCB, to control the illegal bowling trend in the bowlers at the domestic level to avoid any such case at the international level.

Published in Dawn, December 17th, 2019