Pakistan head coach Waqar Younis believes that the World T20 Cup in India represents the last opportunity for captain Shahid Afridi to win a major title.
“Shahid is at the twilight of his career and I think this is the last chance for him to win something big,” Waqar told the media in Lahore on Friday shortly after the Pakistan government gave clearance to the PCB to send the team to India.
The former Test captain expressed relief at the team getting clearance to fly to India.
“It is a good development because we want to go to India and do well there. We are looking forward to the match with India on March 19,” he said.
Waqar admitted that in the last six months the performance of the team in limited overs cricket had been bad.
“In the last six months our form has kept on slipping but I think the World T20 gives us a very good platform to bounce back strongly.”
He didn’t think all the delay over getting clearance to fly to India would affect the team.
“It is good we are going to India to play cricket and we are looking at our visit there in positive light. The players want to do well and cheer up their legions of fans,” he stated.
Waqar also dismissed reports about having differences with Afridi and said both got along well and in the end everyone wanted to do well for Pakistan.
Afridi has been stopped by the PCB from interacting with the media after a couple of tweets that upset the board officials.
The flamboyant allrounder faces the biggest challenge of his career as another dismal performance from the team in India will certainly mean the end to his 19 year international career. And Shahid himself has indicated he wants to carry on in T20 cricket even after the World event after earlier stating he would retire after the event.
But Waqar backed the captain insisting it was unfair to lay the blame on the captain if the team had not performed well.