SYDNEY: Pakistan team mentor Matthew Hayden has put his weight behind out-of-form skipper Babar Azam and has cautioned the opposing teams that they are about to witness some very special knock from the Pakistan captain in the final phase of the T20 World Cup.
Speaking at a press conference here on Tuesday ahead of the first semifinal between the Green Shirts and New Zealand tomorrow at the Sydney Cricket Ground, former Australian cricketer has backed Pakistan’s opening pair, Babar and Mohammad Rizwan, to bounce back from the dip, saying that such special players do not stay down for long.
Hayden supported both of the openers and compared their predicament to that of Adam Gilchrist during the 2007 ODI World Cup.
“Babar and Rizwan rightly are the number one combination,” he said. “Adam Gilchrist… had quite a lean World Cup…(And) that last match against Sri Lanka, he went on to score an incredible hundred and realized his potential in that tournament and awakened the world once again to the fact that he was such a premium player. ”
He further went on to say we all felt the pressure at any given time in our careers and that was no different for the No.1 combination.
Talking about Babar’s form in the current T20 World Cup, Hayden said: “You can’t continue to punching out the fifties and hundreds and the strike rates of 140 plus. There’s got to be moments in time when there’s a lull.”
“As well know about the weather when there’s a lull, there’s often a storm that follows. So look out, the rest of the world because I think you’re about to see something very special from Babar,” he warned.
It is pertinent to mention here that No.4 ranked T20I batter Babar remained unimpressive with the bat in the ongoing mega event as he was dismissed within the single digits four out of five times while he managed an overall 39 runs in the tournament so far.
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