In an effort to get his team ready for the unusually hectic schedule of red-ball cricket, Pakistan’s Test captain, Shan Masood, stated that additional Test matches should be played.
Beginning in Rawalpindi on Wednesday, August 21, Pakistan’s rigorous home season will begin with a two-Test series against Bangladesh. After a two-Test trip of South Africa, they will host five more Tests at home against England and the West Indies. The fact that Pakistan hasn’t played more Tests in a season since the 1998–1999 season, when they played ten matches, illustrates how uncommon this is.
The longer intervals between Test matches, which have slowed the Test team’s progress, have been a greater issue than the test team’s lack of matches. Pakistan’s first Tests since the New Year’s Test in Sydney earlier this year will be against Bangladesh. They have no more Test matches planned until October 2025, against South Africa, when their series against the West Indies concludes in January 2025. The Asian giants have a series scheduled against Bangladesh, so they will have to wait until March 2026 to don the whites after the match against the Proteas.
Shan Masood maintained that there is now a gulf between the big three countries—Australia, England, and India—and the other Full Members as a result of this scheduling’s stop-start nature.
Following his team’s most recent 0-3 loss to England, West Indies red-ball captain Kraigg Brathwaite had also made remarks along these lines. “More Test cricket is what we need. I don’t think we can hold that responsible because we play a lot of domestic cricket. In the PCB podcast, Masood was interviewed by former cricketer and broadcaster Bazid Khan alongside Test coach Jason Gillespie.
“We do play ten first-class matches minimum, and with the introduction of departmental cricket, some players ended up playing 16-17 first-class matches in a year,” Masood stated.
“More important to me is figuring out how to get our team to play more Test matches. Essentially, it involves planning ahead, closing any holes, and making sure our test squads are reliable moving forward. We have nine Test matches in four months, but we also had to contend with an unfavourable schedule that included a trip to Australia before our next Test, which is scheduled for ten months from now. Going forward, Pakistani cricket will need to overcome these obstacles.”
Also Read: The cricket team of Bangladesh visits to Pakistan before to the two-match Test series
Pakistan will try to begin their ascent with strong performances in the upcoming series. Currently ranked fifth in the World Test Championship (WTC) points table.
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