Pakistan rely heavily on Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan, their middle-order a weak link: Danish Kaneria

Former cricketer Danish Kaneria had no qualms in accepting that Pakistan are “heavily relied” on their captain Babar Azam and wicketkeeper-batter Mohammad Rizwan, saying the side didn’t create players in the middle-order after the T20 World Cup last year.

Babar and Rizwan single-handedly took away the game from India during their group match at the ICC event in 2021. The duo was involved in six partnerships by runs together on different occasions last year – 197 vs South Africa, 158 vs West Indies, 152* vs India, 150 vs England, 126 vs Zimbabwe and 113 vs Namibia.

Kaneria, while speaking to indiatoday.in, said the current Pakistan team doesn’t have someone like Shoaib Malik, who would take the side out from troubled waters. The former leg-spinner added that if the openers fail, Pakistan’s batting will get exposed as there is not much talent and experience in the middle-order.

“Absolutely! Pakistan are heavily relied on him (Babar) and Mohammad Rizwan because they are both the openers. They smashed the Indian bowling in 2021. Both singlehandedly took away the game. The way they batted it was superb to watch them. The only thing is that after 2021 T20 World Cup, Pakistan didn’t play so many T20Is and they didn’t make any players in the middle order,” Kaneria told indiatoday.in.

“They had Shoaib Malik who knew how to take Pakistan from a difficult situation to a winning situation and sometimes get to a good target. That part is now missing because if you lose 2-3 wickets in the beginning then you don’t have any player who can build the innings. They have only Khushdil Shah who is a young talented hard hitter but Fakhar Zaman needs to come up with a big show because the way they are playing in the Netherlands shows they need to really improve. They won only by 16 runs against the Netherlands (in the 1st ODI), it was not a good win because the Netherlands had almost a ‘B’ team as most of their players are playing in England. Batting is a weaker link for Pakistan in the middle. Indian bowlers would know that the middle part of the Pakistan batting is weaker because they don’t have that much talent and experienced player.”

Kaneria added that Pakistan wasted a whole year after the T20 World Cup 2021 by not creating a “B” team, citing that India are working on creating a backup team with a rotation policy but Pakistan are moving with the same players everywhere which could potentially lead to injuries.

“I have been saying this for so many years that Pakistan need to build up for the future. Everybody is getting their B team ready. So much of franchise cricket and international cricket is happening so you need a backup and rotation of the players. You can’t move around with one sort of cricketers whole year. It will burden them and then things like injury will happen.

“Pakistan made a blunder, they should have sent Shan Masood as captain to Netherlands and put him with good bunch of replacements in fast bowling and spin department. They have so many batters but I don’t understand their mentality. They have Saud Shakeel who should be playing. Shahnawaz Dahani’s name is coming up and also Zahid Mahmood but the thing is they are just sitting on the bench and doing nothing. They are not getting those opportunities. Pakistan should have sent a young team to Netherlands. There is a fear factor of losing. When you have the fear factor then you can’t build a team, that’s the problem.”

With India and Pakistan set to clash in their opening match at the Asia Cup on August 28, Kaneria said that India have an upper hand because of their bowling strength. He, however, refused to jump to a conclusion as he wanted to first watch players who are returning from injuries.

“It is a bit early to say. I want to see KL Rahul’s form in the Zimbabwe series because he is coming back from injury. Then there is a question on Rohit Sharma who is recovering from his back injury. In the Pakistan team, Naseem Shah was limping around with his knee injury as well and then Shaheen Shah Afridi’s fitness issue. There are few players from both sides who are on the injury list.

“For now, India have that impact, they can come back because they have been playing a good amount of T20 cricket. So 60 percent to India and 40 percent to Pakistan. 60 percent to India because of their bowling strength. India’s spin bowling is good with world-class Ravichandran Ashwin, (Ravi) Bishnoi, (Yuzvendra) Chahal, (Ravindra) Jadeja. And fast bowlers Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Arshdeep Singh, who can do wonders for team India. Pakistan have to look into their bowling department, if there is no Shaheen Shah Afridi then who will be coming in for him?”

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