Former Pakistani pacer Wahab Riaz has called Sarfaraz Ahmed “the sharpest captain” he has ever played under.
Wahab, 38, who had the opportunity to play under many captains in his 12-year-long career with the Pakistan cricket team, had nothing but respect for his previous captains.
However, out of all, the seamer appreciated the 2017 ICC Champions Trophy (CT) winning captain acknowledging his quick-thinking on the field and his leadership abilities as the pacer called him the sharpest captain he has played under.
“Look, captaincy is a different thing. I played in Shoaib Malik’s captaincy then in Shahid Afridi’s captaincy, Misbah’s captaincy and Sarfaraz Ahmed’s captaincy. I think one of the sharpest captains of them all was Sarfaraz,” Wahab said.
“And I think the most sensible thinking captain was Misbah-ul-Haq while Shoaib bhai and Shahid were somebody who used to support the players a lot,” he added.
Riaz — who did not get enough time to play under the current Pakistani skipper Babar Azam — was not shy to admit that Sarfaraz would be his first choice as a captain.
“I got quite minimal time with Babar. Obviously, he was in his learning phase at that time but I think if I had to rate somebody then I would say Sarfaraz was one of the best captains,” he concluded.
It must be noted that Wahab was ruled out of the Champions Trophy 2017 after picking up an ankle injury against India in the group match.
Sarfaraz is one of the most successful captains of Pakistan history. He guided Pakistan to their first-ever Champions Trophy win and also won record 11 consecutive T20 international series.
Pakistan was also ranked number one in T20i cricket for the major part of his captaincy. However, after Pakistan’s disappointing performance in the ICC Cricket World Cup 2019 — where they failed to make it to the knockout stages — he was dismissed by the captaincy.
It is worth mentioning that Sarfaraz did not get an opportunity to lead Pakistan in a 20-over tournament during his captaincy.
- Sarfaraz Ahmed