“Sarfaraz Ahmed Was An Active Captain Whereas Babar Azam…”: Pakistan Star Compares The Two

Babar Azam’s career graph is on the rise. He is currently the world No. 1 batter in ODIs and T20I in ICC rankings. In Tests, he is ranked No. 4. “As a player it’s a dream to become the No. 1 in all formats and, for that, you have to focus and put in hard work. It’s not like if you are the top player in one or two formats, you go easy,” the official website of ICC quoted Babar as saying recently. “If you are to become No.1 in all three, you have to keep yourself fit and on track. There is back-to-back cricket and the gap is less. For that, you need to be extra fit. It’s something I am preparing for. It’s going well in white-ball and hopefully, I will be able to do well in Tests too,” he added.

Azam is also the captain of the Pakistan team. While he is yet to win an ICC event as a vcaptain, under his leadership Pakistan qualified for the semi-final of the 2021 T20 World Cup. Allrounder Shadab Khan has played with both Azam and Sarfaraz Ahmed, who led Pakistan to the 2017 Champions Trophy win, and has compared the two players’ captaincy style. 

“Sarfaraz was an active captain on the field whereas Babar Azam does not depict his emotions much and stays calm. He said that Babar got under pressure in his early phase of captaincy but he is well settled now,” Shadab was quoted as saying by Cricket Pakistan in a Twitter Space.

Recently, former Pakistan captain Javed Miandad highlighted that Babar has led the team from the front, saying that the team is playing more as a unit under his leadership.

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“Team is playing as a unit, and the credit goes to our players as well as our number one captain. He (Babar) is our captain cool. He doesn’t lose his temper and led the team brilliantly,” Miandad said in a video uploaded on his YouTube channel.

Miandad said that Babar hasn’t let captaincy affect his game, which can be the case at times. “The most important thing is he is performing brilliantly himself. He leads from the front. Often, if a captain doesn’t perform, it can affect the team negatively and it leads to his downfall. Babar Azam is mature now. He should be the captain of the team as long as he plays,” said Miandad, represented Pakistan in 124 Tests and 233 ODIs.