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Can Pakistan Afford to Lose Yousuf?
By Tabrez Janjua for Stani Army in Pakistan Cricket
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Has Yousuf waved goodbye to Pakistan cricket once and for all?
Mohammad Yousuf has decided to retire from international cricket after being banned indefinitely by the PCB. Whilst I felt harsh punishments were needed for Pakistan’s various dissenting players, I was surprised not only that Mohammad Yousuf was one of the players to be punished, but that he was punished so severely.
Both he and Younis Khan were banned indefinitely for “infighting” and “attitude”, which had a “bad influence” on the team, the PCB said. A reaction was expected from Yousuf and Younis, and of the two, it was the temperamental Younis who I expected to just give up and retire. But it seems that he is the one putting up the fight after lodging his appeal against the ban, whilst Yousuf has just given up and decided to quit.
Now that Yousuf has made his move, it is time for the PCB to respond. I do believe that by giving him an indefinite ban and not a permanent one, the PCB has left themselves an opportunity to respond. If they are to persuade him not to quit, they will have to either overturn his punishment or turn the indefinite ban into one which will run for only a short duration of time.
I can imagine that Mohammad Yousuf must be hurting at the moment. After being forced to take over the reins when there was no one else willing to, he was harshly criticised for the losses in Australia. The subsequent ban and his exclusion from those centrally contracted must have hit him hard.
I believe that the reason the PCB gave Yousuf and Younis indefinite bans was to give themselves the chance to call both the players back into the international fold. The question is what would Yousuf and Younis have to do to get back in? This is something the PCB needs to make clear otherwise there was no purpose of giving indefinite bans, they could have just banned them permanently.
Shahid Afridi was quoted as saying that Yousuf still “has a lot to give to Pakistan cricket”, and I agree with him. Had we had a wealth of young batting talent coming through then maybe things would be different. But the fact that we have not means that Yousuf is a talent we cannot afford to lose right now.
Mohammad Yousuf’s International ODI and Test Batting Record
ODI Average: 42.39 Strike Rate: 75.15 Fifties: 64 Centuries: 15
Test Average: 53.07 Strike Rate: 52.38 Fifties: 32 Centuries: 24
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March 29th, 2010 at 4:18 pm
What a player!
Will be missed heavily for sure! Big loss for Pakistan cricket…
An elegant, graceful and class act…
His legacy will remain the golden year of 2006 when he broke the record for the most runs in a calendar year, a formidability.
March 29th, 2010 at 5:05 pm
Stani
Without banning Malik,Yousaf and Younis PCB could have never been able to curb the player’s power and dirty politics in the team.
The team only looked good on the paper with the inclusion of these players, if you look at last two year results, these guys for one reason or another didn’t delivered and became totally out of control, we lost three test series only because these guys were busy pulling each others leg.
I think if the fans and the media wants to see Pakistan cricket flourish they will have to show some patience and think rationally and clearly.
These guys deserved to be punished severely. They made us a laughing stock in world cricket, We have to show some faith in the young players and should allow them some time to get established in the team.The 20′s and 30′s these guys were scoring any young talented cricketer can contribute that much, right now there are several players in Pakistan who in a year’s time will be completely ready to become a permanent fixture in Pakistan team.
We haven’t won a test series in last three years despite having these players, it won’t get any worse if we replace these guys with some talented youngsters.
March 29th, 2010 at 6:15 pm
He is arguably Pakistan’s greatest batsmen. I can write endlessly for praising and hailing him….
March 29th, 2010 at 6:57 pm
Maz
I remember that period he had, it was as if he was going to get a century every time he stepped out to bat. The feeling was that he would push on and break many other records and become the top batsman in the world. For various reasons though, that did not happen. I think he was one of the best batsmen to watch. As awkward and cumbersome as he looked in the field, he made up for it with his elegance and gracefulness when the bat was in his hand. That in itself is a miracle.
Wasim
To some extent I agree with you but I was surprised Yousuf got punished at all in the first place. Certainly, the noises coming out before the news of the bans only spoke of Afridi, Malik and the Akmals. But as I mentioned in the article, why did they not just give Yousuf either a permanent ban or one for a set period? They left the door open. Also, they weren’t as harsh on Malik for some reason and gave him a one year ban which means he will be back. Malik for me has been involved in a number of incidents in the past so what was their logic in banning Malik for a year and Younis and Yousuf indefinitely? If they were trying to get rid of the problems then they should have had permanent bans for every one of them. Or, if they were trying to teach the players a lesson then they should have had a set period ban for every one of them, and not just Malik and Rana.
PCB’s response will be interesting.
March 29th, 2010 at 8:10 pm
Wasim
The youth is certainly what needs to be turned to but you can’t punish players in the manner the PCB did, disgraceful…
They are responsible to an extent I agree but at the same time they have done great work for Pakistan cricket which can’t be forgotten and thats how they should be remembered at the end of the day.
The inquiry committe were biased, they held personal grudges against these players (Y an Y)……….
Anyway folks LOL@Malik and Sania Mirza
engagement.
March 29th, 2010 at 8:12 pm
TJ
We could have really done with MOYO in England this summer. That would have been an ideal stage for him to bid farewell….
March 29th, 2010 at 9:52 pm
It would have been nice to have one batsman that averaged 40+.
The (near) future is grim.
Apart from the Chuckle brothers (Akmals) we don’t really have any potentially ‘proper’ batsmen.
March 29th, 2010 at 10:39 pm
Stani
The bottom line is that PCB could not have reformed these players with a slap on the wrist. They have been doing it for so long and we all know that it never worked. They needed an operation clean up, politics and infighting were not the only reasons behind such a strict action there were other factors involved, PCB has been withholding a lot of information.
March 29th, 2010 at 10:44 pm
Essex
Player’s come and go, we should be optimistic about the situation, both Younis and Yousaf at most could have lingered on till the World cup 2011 after that we would have been looking for their replacements anyways.
March 29th, 2010 at 11:05 pm
Maz
I felt harsh punishments were required but I was surprised Yousuf was punished. I thought he would get the sympathy vote because players constantly undermined him as captain and made things difficult for him. He took all the criticism for the performances.
I remember the last time he came over here Maz and his innings at Lords. It was majestic. Yes, you’re right about the farewell although our history has shown us that our heroes are very rarely given a good send off. It is sad.
I’m sure I’ve seen photographs of Sania Mirza being engaged before with some other guy. She must have broken that engagement off then. I can only wish the two all the best….maybe she can teach him some new strokes
Essex
Yes, that is a good point. Who in our line-up averages 40+? I think the opposition will see our batting line up as easy to get through…even easier to get through I should say.
I think even from the Chuckle Brothers we’ll only get one proper batsman and that’s Umar. He seems to have more of a brain.
Here’s a clip of the Chuckle Brothers for our international bloggers.
March 29th, 2010 at 11:10 pm
Wasim
You see I wouldn’t have minded that but they did neither one thing or the other. They have given all the other trouble makers the opportunity to eventually return. I think the PCB needs to go now too.
March 30th, 2010 at 12:48 pm
Didn’t he used the words “for now” when saying he was retiring? Meaning is there a possibility he might come back if the situation with the PCB changed? I wonder what he meant by “for now this is my retirement”.
March 30th, 2010 at 1:12 pm
This is quite a loss for the team as well as for a cricket watcher. Some of his test innings especially just remain etched in my memory. The manner and grace in which he accumulated runs was quite astounding!
@Maz, Stani – Shoaib and Sania – game, set, and MATCH. ugh!
March 30th, 2010 at 1:16 pm
Rayden, I guess we’ll have to wait and watch for more info! The cricket watcher in me would love to see him play on, but who’s to know how boards give the bans. Like TJ mentioned, it would have made more sense to add actual clauses/parameters to the ban, instead of making it indefinite, and pretty much uncertain of what it even means.
March 30th, 2010 at 1:31 pm
Stani
I don’t think it was an indefinite ban, PCB changed it too “till further notice”
and they were available for selection.
I think at the moment we should show trust in the steps taken by PCB we don’t know all the details and it would be unfair to question the judgement of those sitting in the inquiry committee without knowing all the details which they did.
For me the bans and fines are justified by just looking at the performances of these players in the last three test series.
March 30th, 2010 at 3:51 pm
Rayden
Yes. I think he has quit twice in the past and come back so maybe he’ll do the same again. I’d be surprised if the PCB didn’t offer him some sort of reconciliatory hand.
Vick
Let’s hope they each stick around this time as I’m sure they won’t be seeing much of each other due to their commitments….unless Shoaib becomes a ball boy!
Shoaib always had a thing for Indian girls
Wasim
The PCB need to come out as the Younis and Yousuf punishment seems a bit wishy-washy.
I would definitely say that some players underperformed deliberately. But, we should be careful not to accidentally include players in this category that just had a bad series or were out of form. I think Yousuf would have fell into the second category, with his job made a lot tougher by the antics of the rest.
March 30th, 2010 at 5:22 pm
Stani
No doubt that our players don’t get the best of farewells I’m afraid. Imran Khan had a fairy tale ending when he was 40 years of age in front of an electrifying atmospheric MCG where he captained the nation to glory in the WC. Inzy had an emotional one against RSA. He got a duck in the finale innings but no shame to that as Bradman also did in his farewell. Subsequently his batting average concluded on 99.94… phenomenal record
But a lot of our players retire after a negative event of when they lose confidence like after the 2003 WC several greats retired due to the team’s failings/ performance, despite the matter of fact that they were greats, they didn’t have any such farewell which was a pity. They should be able to end an illustrious career positively rather than negatively or critically with this mental/emotional break down which also affects the team atmosphere and national belief.
btw it was another internet romance for Malik
He is on twitter btw
March 30th, 2010 at 6:36 pm
Maz
Absolutely. Even when Inzamam quit the shorter form people criticised him because it was after Bob’s passing. Sky News, in particular their reporter Adam Leventhal, even hinted that he and the rest of the squad, had something to do with Bob’s death would you believe?! Disgraceful.
Stay away from twitter Maz!
March 30th, 2010 at 9:26 pm
Stani
Antics of others??? Like whom?
Pakistan team’s most questionable performance was in the Sydney test.
Malik wasn’t playing that match, Afridi wasn’t there, Younis wasn’t playing.
Yousaf was in total control, the match was lost because of his questionable field placements and bowling changes and finally the way he threw away his wicket in the second innings leaves no doubt that he alongwith Akmal brothers underperformed in that match.
We can’t say that he falls in other category but we can definitely ask the question that why Akmal brothers and a few others were not banned.
Apparently PCB has taken action against the king pins which in my opinion was a good way to deal with the problem, as if they had gone for wholesale changes then there was no way we could have remained competitive in any format on international level.
Atleast now the rest of the players will not dare to underperform, You won’t see those spectecular collapses any more. We might still lose in test matches but we won’t lose matches on the final day by a whisker.
Yousaf has played his same old card of quitting Pakistan team, if he was innocent and the charges levelled against him were not true then he should have appealed against the decision, the appellate tribunal consists of High court judges.
He knew that PCB has enough against him and if he goes to appeal his clean image will get tarnished when the details of charges levelled against him will be made public.
He has planned an alternate route to make a come back a route on which he was successful twice in the past.
He said he is announcing retirement “for now” which means that he is waiting until the pressure builds up on PCB to revoke his ban, the lobby of ex players which has been supporting him in the past will in a few days launch it’s campaign against PCB, and in a few months Yousaf will make a successful comeback without appealing and with all the reputation intact.
March 30th, 2010 at 10:52 pm
Wasim
Like all the others that were punished. Are you saying they were punished for no reason? No, then surely their under-performing and causing unrest are antics? And surely these antics would have made it hard for anyone to captain? I am talking about the whole series and not just the Sydney Test.
I see your point on the kingpins. The ultimate kingpins are the PCB themselves so should we have any hope in anything changing?
I think this constant quitting and then coming back by Yousuf is a sign that he is being ill-advised. Whether it is by family members or his dear friend Inzamam, it is not doing him any good. I’m certain any legal people who he would have spoken to would have advised him to appeal.
Do you think Yousuf deliberately under-performed?
March 31st, 2010 at 12:08 am
Stani
Afridi was punished for ball tampering, Younis for standing up against PCB, Akmal brothers for Sydney test, and Malik for being selfish and playing politics in the team.
But other than Akmal brothers none of the main culprits played in Sydney test. Afridi and Younis were not even with the squad.
I think he is getting the best advise. Just go back in 2007 and see what happened back then, he ditched Pakistan team for ICL, and PCB inorder to get him back covered all the ICL damages and got him a contract with IPL where he made another 300,000 without playing a single match and rumours are that PCb paid him a huge sum of money to lure him back. All for what within 12 months he again left for ICL made money there and again made a comeback.
I have no doubt in my mind that he underperformed in SriLanka, NewZealand and Australia.
There is no way in the world that Kamran Akmal and Imran Farhat could have dropped 5 catches each and had stayed in the team and still managed to get his support if Yousaf was not with them. No captain in the world would have tolerated them.
For a second just imagine that if PCB has evidence of underperformance against Yousuf will he go to appellate tribunal?
PCB is not the kind of organization which hands over life bans for just having a spat with a team mate.
Now think why Younis and Afridi are going to appellate tribunal?
March 31st, 2010 at 11:17 pm
Wasim
You cannot say that for certain as the real reasons for each of the punishments has not been released by the PCB.
As for the ICL; we mustn’t rely on rumours and bring a guy down on those. We all know that the PCB were reactive rather than pro-active when it came to the ICL issue and supporting all of our players.
Are you saying he deliberately underperformed in the countries you mentioned? If so, how are you so sure? As for Akmal; it wasn’t like Pakistan are bursting with good wicket-keepers. Besides, team selection is not only up to the captain.
I think Yousuf will change his mind and appeal.
April 1st, 2010 at 1:30 am
Stani
This is no secret that PCB has not made public the details of the charge sheet levelled against each player. Even the players do not know the exact details that is why they are sending legal notices and requesting for details.
Other than that he took a major sum of money from ICL the second time around their is no other rumour. His defection to ICL still is not justified specially when he was financially compensated by IPL and PCB the first time there was absolutely no justfication for him to leave the second time but he did that shows his character. He ditched PCB, then he ditched ICL, and then ditched IPL and PCB again and went for ICL.
He is not as humble and straight forward as he looks the guy is a crook.
The first test he plays after comeback he scored a century, just look what he did after that in SriLankan series. I don’t have to give you proof for what was going on in the dressing room back then, the team threw away two test matches over there and alongwith Malik and Misbah he was the main culprit.
NewZealand he has the class to punish the Kiwi bowlers all day long, we again lost the first test by just 32 runs. Sydney test he didn’t brought in Sami untill the Aussies got a decent lead, he spread the field as if it was Sachin Tendulkar batting instead of Peter siddle, all the commentators were laughing at his field placement and bowling changes. Akmal kept on dropping catches until Australia got a decent lead. And anybody who knows Mohammad Yousaf’s style of batting knows that he likes to bat long he doesn’t bat in T20 style like the way he batted in the second innings and that too in the last over before tea. We again lost by 30 Odd runs.
True, we don’t have a proper replacement for Akmal but didn’t sarfraz did a good job in the third test, my point was that he didn’t showed any anger or dissent toward Akmal’s performance instead was blatantly trying to protect him, he even said that he is incharge of tour selection and it’s upto him if he wants to play Sarfraz or not. He was not supporting Akmal out of kind heartedness because we all saw what he did to Salman Butt.
If everybody is an angel then you tell me why we have been losing matches which we were suppose to win?
The whole world knows that these guys were pulling each others leg, but how exactly they were doing it ?
By under performance.
It’s not hard to figure out in which matches these guys underperformed.
Pakistani cricket fans should have no right to criticise PCB if they can’t support this disciplinary action.
Those who are criticising PCB should tell me only one thing can these player be reformed by just sweet talk or by a slap on the wrist, we have done that with Shoaib Akhtar in the past and saw the results.
The bottom line is that we haven’t won a test series with these players in last three years if we replace them the results would not be any worse.
April 1st, 2010 at 3:23 pm
Wasim
If we don’t know the details of each player’s misdemeanours then we cannot say that they didn’t make things difficult for the captain. In my opinion, it would have been nigh on impossible to captain that lot successfully.
As for his run in with the ICL; as I touched on before, I think it was a combination of him being badly advised, the reactiveness of the PCB and naiveness on his part.
But why would he captain badly on purpose and bring all that ridicule on himself? Is it not the case that he was just not captaincy material rather than he was being deceitful and sly in losing games on purpose?
I have not said everybody is an angel. What I am saying is that I was surprised he was punished as in the lead up to the enquiry findings release, the talk was of the other players and there was no mention of Yousuf. Added to this, I am saying that there is no point in being harsh on Younis and Yousuf but giving the others, who seem guiltier to me, another chance. I support disciplinary action for those that are guilty. I support tough disciplinary action on those that are guilty, but the PCB has not really killed off the cancer have they?
I think what Malik, Rana, Afridi and the Akmals have got is just a slap on the wrist. So if you agree with that, then you have to agree that they will not be reformed. If evidence comes out showing that Yousuf did something seriously wrong, I will be the first to say he should be banned for life.
April 1st, 2010 at 6:38 pm
Stani
How was PCB reactive In Yousaf’s case in 2007? I think they did every thing to retain him. If you analyze Yousaf’s decision pattern he just followed money and kept on decieving everybody in the process.
Why did Salim Malik threw matches when he was captain, why did Akram and Younis did it? Yousaf did it for the same reason.
And this is the main reason why all the seniors are fighting like dogs with each other. Otherwise no self respecting individual would want this job especially in the current environement.
Malik was handed over a ban not for matchfixing but for playing politics within the team. He was not in a position to fix a match.
Why Kamran Akmal got away with just a fine, that I don’t know maybe PCB didn’t wanted to ban him before the World cup or maybe he bribed somebody or used some influence.
I am not saying that the bans were fair. I think Younis got a raw deal.
Malik and Akmal brothers should have recieved heavier punishment.
April 3rd, 2010 at 7:47 pm
Pakistan beat Pakistan A today in a practise match….
The Akmal bro’s both scored half centuries as did Ahmed Shahzad
April 6th, 2010 at 4:52 pm
My bad : I mean’t Pakistan “A” beat Pakistan that day
careless error 