Shahid Afridi’s Stunning Conditional Retirement from Pakistan Cricket

Shahid Afridi surprised everyone not so much by the announcement of his retirement but ratherby the manner in which he unleashed an unbridled attack on the Pakistan Cricket Board, blaming them squarely for his conditional retirement from playing forPakistan.

Shahid Afridi

The Pakistan all rounder was demoted from the post of Pakistan’s ODI captain after the Pakistan West Indies ODI series despite his team winning the series. The reason, which the Pakistan Cricket Board, did not feel necessary to clarify was the fact that Afridi had yet again violated the PCB’s diktat not to speak out in front of the media of problems within the dressing room.

Afridi, however, refused to hold backafter the West Indies tour, although he initially was not even interested in touring with the Pakistan cricket team to the West Indies over the reported feud, and confirmed to reporters about his reported rift with the Pakistan coach, Waqar Younis, even during the ICC Cricket World Cup2011 where Pakistan made the quarterfinals but failed to get past India in Mohali. That appeared to have put Afridi on a sticky wicket and it was only a matter of time before he was locking heads with the board yet again.

There must have been some reasoning on the part of Afridi to speak out in public despite of past warnings from theboard. Whether it was with the interest to bring the happenings with the board that he thought unbecoming into the limelight or simply spoke out recklessly,Afridi has had to reap the bitter fruit of losing the Pakistan ODI captaincy after holding onto it for a year.This, however, is not the first time that the Pakistan Cricket Board have shown a dislike for the Pakistan captain speaking out in public, even hauling him up with showcause notices.

Refusing to take matters lying down,Afridi did not play the Ireland ODIs citing father’s illness. But perhaps he was planning the assault all along. In a no holds bar revelation, Afridi spoke about the Pakistan Cricket Board run by ‘dishonourable’ men and claimed that he had put up with shoddy teams in the past without having a voice and yet brought home the results in the ODI series despite the murk happening around Pakistan cricket including the spot fixing scandal that implicated three Pakistan cricketers and the disappearance of Zulqarnain Haider over what the latter claimed was harassment by bookies. Afridi further went onto reiterate that his interests in playing for Pakistan had not completely died down but that he would never play under the present administration, putting the heat right back on Ijaz Butt and his men.

However, never seems to be a difficult term within the uncertain environment that is Pakistan cricket. The battle between boards and players has become an inherent one with the likes of Younis Khan,Mohammad Yousuf and others at constant loggerheads with the boards and with retirement announced and then revoked, one can expect that the Shahid Afridi episode is far from over given that the past is expected to be raked up with Afridi’s ball tampering down under as well as his previous public comments that ran him into hot water.