LAHORE: Azhar Ali has brushed aside reports of him being sacked as Pakistan’s Test captain, saying that until he hears anything officially he would not pay any heed to what essentially is ‘just media talk’.
“As far as my captaincy is concerned, I am hearing from the media only and I have not been approached by anyone in Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) in this regard,” he said while addressing a virtual press conference.
The right-handed batsman said that he tries not to think about it and focus on his game. However, he pointed out that such rumours were begun when Pakistan was touring Australia.
“We were on the Australia tour and such types of talks had started. When any official talk will be there then the effort would be made to address that. When there is no official talk about this topic, it is very difficult for me to comment on it,” he added.
Talking about Central Punjab’s defeat at the hands of Sindh in the Quaid-e-Azam trophy (first-class), he said, “In this game, unfortunately, when we had to score big in the first innings the outfield was too slow and batsmen got out in frustration.”
Central Punjab lost their opening Quaid-e-Azam Trophy match by six wickets to Sindh, after a spirited declaration by Azhar on the final day. The Lahore-born batsman was able to muster only 40 runs in his two innings in the match.
He further said, “After 200 and plus runs we made in the first innings, we had taken six of Sindh’s early wickets before Fawad Alam played a superb knock for them and that put us behind.”
“In second innings, we came under pressure. We sent Kamran Akmal up the order to put pressure on Sindh. After we could not score more we thought to set a target for Sindh in 50 overs so that we could produce a win,” he concluded.
Azhar Ali’s batting form has been poor in the last couple of years while he has also faced criticism over his style of captaincy.
