Less than a week after being sacked as the men’s team director, Mohammad Hafeez lashed out at former captain Babar Azam for the poor fitness culture in the Pakistan team. The former Pakistan all-rounder was let go from his position after the team’s brutal 1-4 loss against New Zealand in a T20I series. Hafeez had a four-year contract with the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), but his contract was cut short, following which he took to social media to say that he would reveal the true reason behind Pakistan’s poor run in international cricket.
Speaking on the Pakistani sports channel – A Sports, Hafeez shockingly revealed that when the team had travelled to Australia, he had asked for a fitness report on all the players, which is when he was made aware that the team management, comprising the then-skipper Babar, had specified that fitness was not their priority to check players.
“When we went to Australia, I told the players to take care of their fitness levels. I also asked the trainer about the fitness of the players. He told me a shocking thing that six months ago captain (Babar Azam) and Director of Cricket (Mickey Arthur) told me to stop checking the players on the fitness parameters and let them play the way they want,” Hafeez said.
The veteran cricketer further said that the players could not even complete trial runs of 2 kilometres while their fat levels revealed that they were completely unfit to play at the international level.
“When the fat levels of the players were checked, the skin fold of all of them was high – for most players it was 1.5 times the limit. They were unfit and some of them couldn’t complete a 2 KM trial run. The decision taken 6 months back overruled the set criteria for fitness. You will suffer defeats if the fitness is like that,” he added.
Pakistan had failed to make the semifinals in the 2023 ODI World Cup in India last October. Following the poor campaign, Babar lost his position as a captain as Pakistan made wholesome changes across formats in terms of captaincy. However, Pakistan’s fate remained the same as they were whitewashed in the Test series in Australia in December followed by a T20I series loss in New Zealand.
