Former Pakistan captain Ramiz Raja offered a piece of advice to star batter Babar Azam, who is going through a rough patch with the bat, particularly in Test cricket.
Babar has thus far managed to score 250 runs in seven matches of the ongoing World Test Championship (WTC) 2023-25 at a dismal average of 22.72 and the highest score of just 41.
He bagged a two-ball duck in the first innings of the home series opener against Bangladesh while managing just 22 in the second innings as Pakistan succumbed to a 10-wicket defeat.
Meanwhile, former Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman Ramiz Raja, speaking on his YouTube channel, Ramiz Speaks, defended under-fire Babar Azam, stating that the star batter receives severe criticism with each of the national team’s defeats.
“It seems the entire nation does not have a problem with anything except the form of Babar Azam. Unfortunately, what happens is when you lose a match and you have not scored runs and if you are Babar Azam, then you become a headline – How did we lose? What did he do? What was his contribution? And then this is the era of social media. Anybody can criticise and ridicule anyone, this should be discouraged as much as possible,” said Raja.
Follow us on our Official WhatsApp channel
“Cricket is in our blood but don’t know for how long if we continue to lose matches like this in Test cricket. Fan following increases with wins and fans identify themselves with success stories. Babar Azam has had a famous success story. There is no doubt that he has been a big player in all three formats,” he concluded.
For the unversed, Babar Azam finished as the fourth-highest run-scorer in the previous cycle of the WTC with 1527 in 14 matches.
However, in the ongoing edition, the star batter is ranked 48th, behind some of the bowlers and bowling all-rounders like Chris Woakes, Jason Holder, Pat Cummins, Mehidy Hasan Miraz and Ravindra Jadeja.
READ: Mohammad Amir fails to defend 16 runs in the final over