I dont think in Pakistan ever a single person got to hold the dual roles of Head Coach and Chief Selector at the same time. This meant not only one person holds more power, but no more complaining by the head coach that the selector was not selecting certain players.
The problem was solved by giving the job to one person who was Misbah. Now it was Misbah to do justice to that role.
When Misbah was captain, he did face interference from selectors, when it came to choosing squad. Even when choosing a playing 11, he had to face interference from the team manager Moin Khan. Thus, many of us believed that had no such interference existed we would had yielded better results
Sadly, it does not look like Misbah has done justice to the role of dual charge. He was trusted with a charge and if he was able to deliver on it, could had inspired and revolutionized cricket.
At the end of the day, when we lose the series he will be responsible. Misbah seems to care too much about seniority and relationships, he needs to understand that he needs to save his job. If the team performs bad, Azhar Ali or Asad Shafiq are not gonna save him, infact there bad performance will not only lead to him being fired but not being able to get another coaching gig in future with some other team.
The reason why am i saying all this is because of the decisions he took today, very baffling decisions.
You have an Asad Shafiq who couldn't bat well in the first test and you have a Shadab Khan who batted well and came handy with the ball. Now you want to play another batsmen in the team who is technically making his debut. Everyone knows that debutents in cricket dont usually score runs in their first few games. The first game is infact to see if the guy has talent to survive in future and doesn't matter how much he scores in that game.
Misbah ends up removing Shadab and replacing him with Fawad.
Had Misbah replaced Asad with Fawad, no one would had complained. Asad was out of form, and he got replaced by a player who didn't perform so no bid deal. The other guy shadab who performed in last game will probably score runs.
But Misbah removed Shadab. So now not only do you have an out of form Asad, but a kind off debut batsmen also playing. To top it off we have a captain who is severely out of form but cannot be replaced as he is captain. Now Sarfraz was removed due to bad form as a batsmen. If misbah doesn't do the same with Azhar, he will come out as a hypocrite.
Sometimes you need to act smart to save yourself from criticism, Misbah hasn't acted smart here.
I am a fan of his, and always trust his decisions as he has good reasons to back them. But sometimes, even you can see how dumb some decisions could be. Azhar and Asad are playing due to seniority, nothing else. ANd we might see similar things in One Day when Shoaib Malik gets to play.
I gave a pass to Misbah when he play Shezad and Umar Akmal, as i thought it was a move to get them out of the way
I gave a pass to Misbah when we were whitewash in Australia as no one from Pakistan has ever won there
I gave a pass to Misbah when he did not play Fawad in Pakistan, as maybe Asad and Azhar needed to regain form by playing in Pakistan
But, now we are about to bottle the series here and the guy is destroying his career as a coach by some dumb decisions
I will still back him though as a fan, but he needs to realize that he cant be right every time. Needs someone over him