Babar Azam, Pakistan’s star batter and former skipper of Pakistan’s national cricket team, on Thursday met Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi, who is also heading the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) as chairman.
The meeting took place soon after the PCB Selection Committee proposed Babar Azam’s name as the next captain of the national squad. According to sources, preparations for the ICC Cricket World Cup and cricket series before the World Cup came under discussion at the meeting between Babar Azam and Mohsin Naqvi.
Sources say that Naqvi had tasked the Selection Committee with coming up with proposals for appointment of a new captain of the Pakistan cricket team and the committee has now submitted its proposals to the PCB chairman. Reports suggest that among other cricketers the committee has also proposed Babar’s name as the next captain.
The development comes less than five months after the PCB removed Babar Azam as captain of all three formats and replaced him with Shaheen Shah Afridi as captain of the T20 team and Shan Masood as captain of the Test team.
On November 15, 2023, the PCB announced that Shan has been appointed captain till the end of the ICC World Test Championship 2023-25. Shan’s first assignment was a three-match Test series against Australia in Australia starting from 14 December and Australia clean-swept the series.
Also, the PCB had announced at that time that left-arm pacer Shaheen Shah will lead Pakistan Men’s Team in the T20I format and his first assignment as captain will be the five-match T20I series in New Zealand from 12 to 21 January.
