Time for Pakistan Cricket to see the Back of http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Ijaz-Butt-c64128 – Pakistan Cricket
Ijaz Butt, who was pronounced as the Chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) on 6 October, 2008 by Pakistan’s president Asif Ali Zardari has had a turmoil filled tenure as the head of Pakistan cricket and now perhaps the time has finally come for Pakistan
Cricket to bid farewell to the controversial chairman.
Rumours in Pakistan suggest that Butt, will not be given extension in his contract which will expire in October this year, meaning that Pakistan might soon see a new face leading the country’s cricket.
Recent months have seen immense pressure on the PCB chairman to clean up his act and steer things in the right direction, however, so far Pakistan has not seen anything commendable by the PCB which would suggest a positive change in the game of cricket in
Pakistan.
Since the ouster of Pakistan’s former one-day skipper http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Shahid-Afridi-c2482, Butt has faced extreme criticism as many in Pakistan believe that sacking Afridi was a wrong thing to do. Butt further shot himself in the foot by appointing the 37-year-old middle-order
batsman http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Misbah-ul-Haq-c1972 as the captain of Pakistan in the shorter version of the game.
Naming Misbah, who is six years older than Afridi, is beyond comprehension as the general notion is that a younger player should have been given the realms of the one-day squad.
Afridi, who has a huge fan following all over the world landed in the eye of the storm after the five-match one-day series in the http://www.senore.com/Cricket/West-Indies-c760 when the flamboyant all-rounder blamed the interference from the team management in team selection which caused
Pakistan to lose the fourth and fifth one-day games after taking the tournament by winning the first three game.
These statements received a bashing from the PCB, as Afridi was seen guilty of violating PCB’s code of conduct which prohibits players from giving any statements to the media without the exclusive consent of the Board.
Afridi was slapped an explanation for his remarks and had his captaincy stripped off because of his robust remarks. Eyeing this as an insult, the 31-year-old Afridi decided to ditch http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Ireland-c751 and then later announced his retirement from
international cricket on 30 May, 2011 citing irreconcilable relations with the PCB.
After his retirement, the PCB immediately terminated his central contract and revoked his No Objection Certificate (NOC) which is required by most Pakistan players to play domestic cricket overseas.
Afridi also required this NOC to play for the English county club Hampshire in the Friends Life T20. Deciding not to back down, the all-rounder took a legal action against the cricket board to get his NOC reinstated.
However, the matter was resolved outside court, when Pakistan’s interior minister Rehman Malik stepped in to end the debacle.
However, when Afridi was in England playing for http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Hampshire-c789, Butt in an interview accused the former skipper of deliberately losing the last two matches in West Indies. These statements have now been rebuffed by Afridi who this week clarified that he was wrongly
accused by the chairman.
Meanwhile, Butt has also faced the brunt of cricket fans for discarding Pakistan’s most prolific all-rounder http://www.senore.com/Cricket/India-c750 in the semi-final.
Butt has also been accused of failing to handle the spot-fixing debacle which saw three Pakistan players http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Mohammad-Asif-c1993 banned from the sport of a minimum period of five years after they were found guilty of deliberately bowling
no-balls against http://www.senore.com/Cricket/England-c56013 in the Lord’s Test in 2010.
Pakistan cricket needs a new face to mend the sports in the country in order to resume international cricket which has failed to attract foreign teams because of the depleted security situation in the country.
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