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The initial casualties of Pakistan’s dismal T20 World Cup campaign are Wahab Riaz and Abdul Razzaq, who were both fired as national team selectors. Razzaq, who was only a few weeks ago nominated to the men’s and women’s selection committees, will no longer be a selector for the women’s team. It’s expected that an official announcement of the departures will come later this week.
Wahab’s employment was in jeopardy when Pakistan was eliminated from the T20 World Cup in the group stages. Wahab was considered the de facto leader of the committee even after he was dismissed as chief selector earlier this year and formally assigned as one of seven selectors to a committee without a chief at all. Wahab had expressed frustrations to himself about this public impression, mainly since it made him the target of criticism for any judgements the committee made.
The composition of the selection committee is also anticipated to change, as previously reported, with the eventual expectation of a top selector’s reappointment. It seems unlikely that Wahab and Razzaq would be added to the panel to make up the numbers because the panel’s numerical strength is predicted to decline.
Wahab’s quick fall from favour is not surprising given that he was thought to be very close to PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi. While Naqvi was named interim chief minister of Punjab, Wahab served in his cabinet as caretaker minister of sports. Wahab then followed Naqvi to the PCB, where he was first appointed chief selector. In addition, Wahab went to the T20 World Cup with the Pakistani team as senior team manager—a position he is probably about to lose. It is believed that Naqvi was eager to show that nobody was exempt from negative outcomes.
By making this decision, the PCB has essentially made another 180-degree flip in the process of selecting players for the Pakistan national team. Less than four months have passed since the seven-member committee was announced. Wahab was removed as chief selector, and Naqvi stated that the committee would “make a majority decision based around debate and argument to reach a satisfactory conclusion” at the time. Each of the seven members has an equal vote.
It also suggests that the instability that has beset the selection committee in previous years will persist. Over the last four years, the PCB has had six top selectors: Wahab, Mohammad Wasim, Shahid Afridi, Inzamam-ul-Haq, Haroon Rashid, and Misbah-ul-Haq, all of whom had brief tenures.
The head coach and captain of their respective versions, Asad Shafiq, Bilal Afzal, a statistics analyst, and Muhammad Yousuf round out the remaining five members of the selection committee.