The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) announced that Mohammad Hafeez’s tenure as the Director – Pakistan Men’s Cricket Team has come to an end. Hafeez was appointed Director – Pakistan Men’s Cricket Team in the aftermath of a disappointing ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023 campaign. The side failed to make it to the semi-finals and finished with just four wins. This saw several changes in the Pakistan leadership setup.
After Babar Azam resigned from captaincy, Shan Masood and Shaheen Afridi were given leadership responsibility in the Test and T20I formats respectively. Mickey Arthur, the former Director of the Men’s cricket side, along with Grant Bradburn, the former head coach, and Andrew Puttick, the former Batting coach, were all assigned to the National Cricket Academy in Lahore. Later, the trio resigned from their respective posts.
Another big development in the Pakistan setup was the termination of Haris Rauf’s central contract. He was penalised following a probe by the PCB into his refusal to join Pakistan’s Test squad for the recently concluded Australia tour.
Mohammad Hafeez was given the responsibility on the back of a rich cricketing career. The all-rounder had featured for Pakistan in 55 Tests, 218 ODIs, and 119 T20Is and had scored 12,780 runs along with 253 wickets to his name.
However, Pakistan’s run Down Under was underwhelming. Despite showing sparks of brilliance, Pakistan lost the three-game Test series by a decisive margin of 3-0. Their run in the five-game T20I series in New Zealand was no better, where the side lost 4-1.
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