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Shoaib Akhtar criticized Pakistan’s cricket management as ‘brainless and clueless’ after their six-wicket defeat to India within the 2025 Champions Trophy, blaming poor team selection.
Shoaib Akhtar speaking on Pakistan’s defeat. (X/@shoaib100mph)
Shoaib Akhtar called the Pakistan men’s cricket management ‘brainless and clueless’ after the team’s heavy, six-wicket defeat to India in Dubai on Sunday within the 2025 Champions Trophy.
He criticized their team number of an all-rounder-heavy side and said the team management chased ‘intent’ after they couldn’t even match the skillset of their Indian counterparts Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and Shubman Gill, adding that it wasn’t the players’ fault that the management didn’t know what to do.
Pakistan could only rating a sub-par 241 in the primary innings which India chased down with greater than seven overs to spare, led by Kohli’s unbeaten century. India’s win ensured that the Men in Green’s probabilities of qualifying for the semi-final of their home tournament were quite slim.
“I’m not disillusioned in any respect because I knew what would occur,” Akhtar said in a candid video on his X account. “You may’t select five bowlers, the entire world is playing six bowlers… you go together with two all-rounders but that is just brainless and clueless management. I’m really disillusioned. We will’t blame the children; they’re identical to the management—they don’t know what to do. The intent is a distinct thing, they don’t have the skillsets like Rohit, Virat, and Shubman. Neither they know anything, nor the management. They’ve just gone to play with none clear direction. Nobody knows what they need to do.”
The previous Pakistani pacer had put one other video after the primary innings, where he sounded much more disillusioned. He suggested that somebody from the batting lineup needed to play like Australia’s Glenn Maxwell, but they didn’t have the required skillset.
“This was the batting. Everyone knows the aptitude of this batting lineup. They will only show intent after they have the skillset. After they don’t have the skillset how can they do what Glenn Maxwell did (against Afghanistan within the 2023 World Cup)… just intent isn’t enough. You would like intent, skillset and the execution, only then can you set up rating. But this was Pakistan’s batting for you,” Akhtar said.
Pakistan will now play against Bangladesh on February 27 for his or her final league stage game. They’ll hope that Bangladesh beats Latest Zealand and Pakistan beats Bangladesh by a large margin to qualify for the knock outs on the idea of their Net Run Rate.
