Delhi: Former Pakistan cricket team captain and veteran all-rounder Shahid Afridi has said that Babar Azam should have played under the captaincy of Shaheen Afridi, this would have increased his respect in my eyes and in the eyes of the world. After the poor performance of the Pakistan team in the ICC World Cup held in India last year, Babar decided to leave the captaincy, after which Shan Masood was given the captaincy of the Test team, while Shaheen was given the captaincy of the T20 team.

The team later suffered a whitewash in a 3-Test series against Australia and a 4-1 defeat in a 5-match T20I series against New Zealand, resulting in the PCB once again handing over the captaincy to Babar ahead of the T20 World Cup 2024.

Shahid Afridi, while talking to private media, said, “If Babar Azam had taken a stand earlier and said that I want to play under Shaheen's captaincy, then Babar Azam's respect would have increased further in my eyes and in the eyes of the world.”

Shahid Afridi once again complained that if you had made Shaheen the captain, then removing him from the captaincy immediately was a very wrong way.

Talking about factionalism in the national team during the T20 World Cup 2024, the former cricketer said, “Factionalism weakens any captain, when factions start forming in a team, it means that the respect of the captain starts decreasing in the eyes of the boys. Having a group weakens the captain, because you criticize the bowlers for every failure, never criticize the batsman, if the captain is strong, then there will never be talk of such grouping.”

Inzamam scolded captain Babar for Pakistan's poor performance

Former Pakistan cricket team captain and legendary batsman Inzamam-ul-Haq criticized captain Babar Azam's performance and his captaincy after his national team's defeat against the United States (USA) and India in the ICC T20 World Cup 2024. 54-year-old Inzamam-ul-Haq said in a statement that Babar Azam accepted the captaincy for the second time, but he could not do justice to his performance and captaincy.

It is noteworthy that Shaheen Shah Afridi is the son-in-law of Shahid Afridi.