Can Shoaib Akhtar provide coherence to Lahore Qalandars?

Same old Qalandars. A flashy and rollicking start, followed by timid and meek surrender. We have seen this many a time from Rana Fawad’s team. Or is it his team? Perhaps its McCullum calling the shots. Paddy Upton was there for the 1st two seasons and now Aqib Javed has the reins. However, there hasn’t been much of a change in strategy. The personnel change a little but strategy remains the same. All out attack at all cost, seems to be mantra. That really has been McCullum’s mantra for a while. He changed New Zealand cricket with it for a while. He had limited success with it. Not that he won the World Cup or big away series applying those strategies. But its a macho idea of hyper aggression.

With years of Misbah, in which we preferred method over mayhem, slow choke over cut throat approach, there is a large audience for ‘aggression’. The narrative has been built for years. Pakistan has been losing because Misbah is defensive kaptan. Some called him jackal (a symbol of opportunism and cowardliness), others called him Pakistan ka buzdil kaptan. Now one of those in Shoaib Akhtar, after years of propagating the idea of relentless aggression is calling for calm heads and building an innings. You’d chuckle a bit at that idea had it not been the very apparent misery of Rana Fawad and the Qalandar’s fans.

Read More : Sohail Akhtar shows glimpses of his talent in a cameo

In an interview with the very knowledgeable Zainab Abbas, Shoaib Akhtar said that he is not part of the Qalandar’s coaching set up. But he is there as a mentor and in his own words has just arrived. So it remains to be seen what impact it has on team performance. Will Akhtar push for some sort of balance between attack and defence? More importantly will McCullum allow for it? The image and ideology he has built a name for himself, will he be willing to accept that it isn’t working?