WHY WAS IMAM BENCHED VS NZ – IMAM UL HAQ PROTESTS ON TWITTER
Imam Ul Haq, Pakistan’s left-handed opening batsman has been a mainstay of the Pakistan’s ODI lineup for a long time now and is a permanent opener of Pakistan’s ODI team along with Fakhar Zaman, but suddenly he has been benched for two consecutive matches against New Zealand and a tweet from his account provides more fuel to the speculations.
The left-handed opening batsman of Pakistan’s ODI team took the TWITTER and posts a cryptic tweet that spread like fire in the jungle and every cricket fan is discussing this topic as the series against New Zealand comes to an end.
Pakistan was scheduled to play the fifth and final ODI match against New Zealand at the National Bank Cricket Arena, Karachi, and Imam Ul Haq posted a tweet using his TWITTER account which started all the speculations that something is not fine in the team and Imam Ul Haq is not happy after being benched for the last 2 matches of the ODI series.
‘’ Life is an unexpected journey so never expect anything from anyone. Be Patient, Allah is watching ‘’, IMAM UL HAQ tweets before the start of the match.
There is definitely no issue related to his fitness and performance in the team because Imam Ul Haq was a part of the first 3 ODI matches that were played in Pindi Stadium, Rawalpindi, and National Stadium, Karachi respectively.
Imam Ul Haq scored two fifties in three matches he played in this ODI series – In his first match against New Zealand he scored a knock of 60 runs from 65 balls, got a good start in the second match but failed to convert into a big one, scored another exceptional knock of 90 runs from 107 balls in the third match of the ODI series against New Zealand, missed out on a century but eventually won the match of the match award.
| FIRST ODI | 60 (65) |
| SECOND ODI | 24 (26) |
| THIRD ODI | 90 (107) |
The left-hander who is currently in the TOP 5 of the ICC ODI batting rankings scored a collective of 174 runs in 3 innings he played at an average of 58 so performance was not the issue but was still benched for the final two ODI matches against New Zealand, followed by this TWEET from Imam Ul Haq which has now raised many questions.
After the knock of 90 runs in the third ODI match, Imam Ul Haq attended the press conference, his views about the changes in the team were discussed quite a lot in the media when he said that there is no time to experiment with the playing XI as the ICC ODI Cricket World Cup is just round the corner and we don’t have many matches left.
- Even though this was not anything that was controversial and Imam was spot on with what he said in the press conference, all we know he has been dropped after this conference and we don’t know what’s going on in the dressing room.
Pakistan’s opening batsman, Imam Ul Haq, and Captain Babar Azam are playing with each other since the start of their professional career – Babar Azam has even revealed on many occasions that Imam Ul Haq is his best friend, they both are good friends and everyone knows this and that’s why you can’t expect someone to drop a close friend just because of a press conference.
Another thing that is circulating in the media is that Imam Ul Haq is benched for the last ODI matches against New Zealand just to fit another left-handed opener in the team as an opener, Shan Masood has always been under pressure since the start as he has been blamed that he comes into the team because of some PR of influence by some higher officials of the board.
A very recent example is there when Shan Masood was announced as the Vice-Captain of the ODI team of Pakistan, no one can expect a player with an experience of even less than 10 matches to be announced as the deputy of the captain but when things like these happen you definitely think otherwise, and that’s the case with Shan Masood as well.
We don’t know what is exactly the truth but after this tweet by Imam Ul Haq whole Pakistani fan base showed their solidarity with Imam Ul Haq on social media and demanded his inclusion back into the playing XI of the Pakistan ODI team not because of any PR but because everyone knows that Imam Ul Haq is a very consistent performer of the ODI team as an opener.
Another major problem here is that you can’t experiment with your main opener in a World Cup year when you don’t even have any matches left, and in case Asia Cup 2023 is canceled Pakistan is not scheduled to play any more ODI matches before the start of the ODI Cricket World Cup 2023 in India and this is not a good sign for any international team, let hope everything stays fine and Babar Azam and management addresses the concerns of Imam Ul Haq before the start of the World Cup.
