5 Top Contenders for New Head Coach of Pakistan Cricket Team

Pakistan Cricket Team

The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) is about to replace their head coach Mickey Arthur as PCB axed the whole coaching staff after the team’s poor performance in the World Cup. PCB is about to advertise for the post for their new Head Coach and attract applications from interested high profile candidates to fill the position.

PCB has recently announced that it has completed its Contract period with the outgoing Head Coach, Mickey Arthur with his supporting staff; including the bowling Coach, Azhar Mahmood, batting Grant Flower and trainer Grant Luden.

Also Read: 5 Possible candidates for the new Head Coach of the Indian Cricket Team

According to several news reports, former Pakistan captain, Misbah-ul-Haq is one of the top contenders for the Head Coach for Pakistan Cricket team. Misbah-Ul-Haq has been a seasoned campaigner and has represented Pakistan in 75 Tests and 162 ODIs before his retirement from all forms of International Cricket in the year 2017.  Four other Probable candidates are Tom Moody, Andy Flower, Ottis Gibson and Mike Hesson.

Here we look at the top 5 contenders for the new Head Coach of Pakistan Cricket team: 

  • Misbah-ul Haq: Misbah-ul Haq is considered one of the top contenders for the recently vacated position of the head coach of the Pakistani national cricket team. He represented the Pakistan national team in 75 tests and 162 ODIs. He gained a good reputation as an important driving force for the team in the role of a captain after the spot fixing scandals in 2010. He holds the record of being the most successful test captain of Pakistan with 26 wins.
  • Tom Moody: A former international cricketer, commentator and coach, 53-year-old Tom Moody has a substantial amount of experience and records to be a fit candidate for the position of the head coach. Previously he was coaching the IPL franchise Sunrises Hyderabad. In 2017 he also applied for the head coach of the Indian cricket team. He was coaching the Sri Lankan national team from 2005 and in 2007 led them to the World Cup final.
  • Mike Hesson: New Zealand born Mike Hesson was the coach of the New Zealand cricket team from 2012-2018 and is considered one of the most successful coaches of the team. He is among the top contender for this position. As he announced on Twitter, he is also one of the top contender for the head coach of the Indian cricket team. Previously he coached the Kenya national team from 2011-2012. He is often admired for developing a superb team culture that he also helped to maintain. He has a reputation for being a brilliant man-manager.
  • Ottis Gibson: A former West Indies cricketer, Ottis Delroy Gibson was the head coach of the West Indies national team from 2010-2014. He was also the bowling coach of England twice and most recently he coached the South African team from 2017-2019. He played in 15 ODIs and had the reputation as a hard-hitting late middle order batsman apart from his capability of genuine pace bowling. On 4th August 2019 Gibson along with the entire South African coaching team was sacked following a disastrous performance of South Africa in the recent World Cup.
  • Andy Flower: Andy Flower is currently occupied with coaching jobs but he earned his reputation as the finest batsman to play for the Zimbabwe cricket team.  He was the former captain of Zimbabwe and was the wicket keeper of the team for more than 10 years. He is considered one of the best wicket keeper batsmen to grace the game of cricket. In 2007 he was appointed as the assistant coach of the England cricket team. Later on he was the head coach of the England cricket team for more than 5 years. In 2011 he was awarded the coach of the year award by BBC sports personality of the year awards.

Pakistan urgently requires reinvigoration for their National Cricket team after the ICC World Cup 2019 where it was a mixed performance report although a lot was being expected from the very talented Pakistan Cricket team. It remains to be seen which coach ultimately gets the coveted job although he will have a huge task on his plate to prepare the team for the ICC T20 World Cup 2020 to be held in Australia.

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