For Pakistan skipper Sarfraz Ahmed, 2018 has been a forgettable year. Amid Pakistan’s topsy-turvy year and criticisms of Sarfraz’s captaincy with many asking him to step down, the cricketer also witnessed a dip in his form, especially in Test cricket. And after recording an embarrassing pair in Centurion on Friday against South Africa, former Pakistani cricketer Shoaib Akhtar slammed the cricketer for his poor form in Test cricket.
Pakistan played a total of nine Tests in 2018 winning only four which included the one-off match against Ireland, the draw against England and a 1-0 win over Australia. And in those nine matches, Sarfraz scored 337 runs at 24.07 – his lowest since 2013. His best performance came in the second Test match against Australia at Abu Dhabi where he scored tow back-to-back fifties. However, he ended the year to a duck in each innings in the series opener against South Africa.
Left unimpressed over his batting in Centurion, Akhtar taunted Sarfraz from promoting Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan’s newly-released movie ‘Zero’. “I’ve heard that Sarfaraz Ahmed is promoting Shah Rukh Khan’s latest movie Zero. This type of criticism will keep coming at him when he doesn’t give good performances,” said the legendary pacer as quoted by a reputed Pakistani journalist.
“My message for Sarfaraz is not to worry about this sort of pressure and to continue leading the team with the best of his abilities. You cannot run a cricket team by looking at statistics alone and in my book, Sarfaraz’s name would feature as the first name on any team list I would make as to me, he is our best wicket-keeper who can also score runs when needed. Honestly speaking, we have no other option to replace him as Test captain and he should be persisted with and to those looking for scapegoats for the defeat to New Zealand, my advice would be to think of getting rid of some of the under-performing players instead of the captain,” said Miandad as quoted by pakpassion.net.