Pakistán elimina a los ‘3 grandes’ Babar Azam, Shaheen Afridi y Naseem Shah para la segunda y tercera prueba de Inglaterra

The ‘surgery’ that Mohsin Naqvi had claimed would happen after Pakistan lost to the USA in June has finally happened. Pakistan have dropped Babar Azam, Shaheen Afridi and Naseem Shah from their Test team. Having suffered a humiliating defeat in Multan, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) thought enough was enough and decided to do away with their best three players in the last 5 years ahead of the second England Test. 

Babar Azam’s woeful form

There were reports of Babar Azam getting dropped. Since January 2023, the former skipper hasn’t even scored a half-century and averages just 20.7. His poor show against Bangladesh and England seemed to have been the last straw. PCB’s newly appointed 7-man national selection committee thought it was the right call to drop him. According to Geo News journalist Arfa Feroz Zake, just one of the seven members of the committee was in favour of having Babar in the squad, and therefore he was replaced by Kamran Ghulam.

Babar Azam’s Test record since January 2023

Pakistan’s squad for 2nd & 3rd England Tests

Shan Masood (c), Saud Shakeel (vc), Aamir Jamal, Abdullah Shafique, Haseebullah (wk), Kamran Ghulam, Mehran Mumtaz, Mir Hamza, Mohammad Ali, Mohammad Huraira, Mohammad Rizwan (wk), Noman Ali, Saim Ayub, Sajid Khan, Salman Ali Agha and Zahid Mehmood.