The mental gymnastics on this forum is astounding. From saying "no anchors in modern T20 cricket" to "not all need to be power hitters in T20 cricket". What a journey!!!
I've been the biggest supporter of Salman Agha on this forum, and I categorically state that he should never be in the T20 team, let alone be captain. He's just one 5-0 T20 series whitewash away from being ridiculed and sidelined, which will impact his ODI and Test game so much that Pakistan will struggle to find a good replacement for him in the longer formats where he is absolutely necessary.
The solution was never to have straight up hitters as openers and just hit out in powerplay. T20 openers generally have lower strike rates and higher averages than midddle order for a reason. You need a good platform. Just an obsession over opening powerplay, when it wasn’t the main issue.
In the same way a guy like Hasan Nawaz does well in middle order. You don’t way stabilisers in middle order and than the riskier hitters up top. That doesn’t work as it forces the aggressive batsmen to consilidate and defend which is something they’re not good at. And forces the guys who can actually produce a long innings to hit and get out instead.
Babar and Rizwan’s issues were their poor acceleration once set. Our middle order issues weren’t due to them either, it was just a lack of quality middle order batsmen.
Saim and Farhan should be backed. Rizwan and Babar aren’t even the form they used to be, and these two can be better if they show better ability to accelerate at the end which they have potential to do so. We should continue to push to find other middle order batsmen like Hasan Nawaz who have higher strike rates and lower averages (even though Hasan has a really good average for how fast he strikes).
I think we need one more consistent high averaging batsmen that can set a platform at no.3 in case one of our openers fall. Babar could and to some extent was that at no.3 before but I don’t know if he can still do it out of form, Hafeez did it for a while before he retired, maybe Agha can step up.
What does concern me a bit about Agha is it’s tough for him suit a position. He doesn’t play at 3 generally especially if an early wicket falls. Someone like Haris comes in who isn’t exactly the guy you want to count on to stabilise the innings, more you want him to hit when a platform is set. When we are off to a good start, again Agha holds himself back and puts on the more aggressive batsmen (and even allrounders) to maximise strike rate. Which is the right call. But then it kind of feels Agha is just playing like an emergency batsmen in a total collapse, or a batsman that comes in at 5 when we are doing average not great. It just means he’s so situational. And the no.3 position continues to be an issue for us.
I’m open to see how Agha can play at 3, as the sort of innings he likes to play could work there if he somehow replicates it at 3. Otherwise I think he’s got to change his game and become that more aggressive batsman if he’s finding himself coming into the game so late down the order. If he can’t do either, probably we need to find someone else, but given his ODI success, I’d like to test him out first.