From 2018 to 2021, Ehsan Mani presided over the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB). From 2003 to 2006, he served as the ICC’s president as well. Shahid Afridi’s criticism of Pakistani cricket following the Men in Green’s failure to advance to the 2025 Champions Trophy knockout stages was dismissed by Mani. One of the best all-round players to have ever played cricket, Afridi, claimed that bad choices had left the “cricket in Pakistan cricket in ICU.”
Despite Shadab Khan’s dismal performances in his previous ten domestic cricket matches, the 45-year-old continued to criticize the selectors’ choice to include him in the T20I squad, which will play five matches in New Zealand beginning on Sunday, March 16.
Afridi’s opinions were dismissed by Ehsan Mani, who asserted that the former Pakistan captain had “his own personal agendas.”
However, after poor performances in the 2023 ODI World Cup, 2024 T20 World Cup, and the most recent Champions Trophy, the 79-year-old believes that Mohsin Naqvi, the current chairman of the PCB, and the board’s directors must lead Pakistan cricket as a whole.
“I don’t believe what Shahid Afridi or anybody else says. Whatever it is, they have their own agendas. I wouldn’t go there, then. I have nothing to say about that. All I would say is that the PCB’s chairman and board of directors need to be the leaders. I don’t think these criticisms have much merit,” Mani told Hindustan Times.
In the upcoming white-ball series against New Zealand, who advanced to the Champions Trophy finals, the Men in Green will try to turn things around. As the Kiwis prepare for the Indian Premier League 2025, which begins on March 22, they will be missing a few of their best players. Salman Ali Agha will represent Pakistan in the Twenty20 Internationals after regular skipper Mohammad Rizwan, Babar Azam, and Naseem Shah were benched. Following the T20I rubber, the two teams will play a three-match ODI series.
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