Once considered as one of the finest pacers in business, Pakistani cricketer Mohammad Amir has had quite a dramatic downfall in stocks. The left-arm speedster was repeatedly overlooked in the national team. The snubs prompted Amir to take a rather premature call of hanging up his boots from international cricket in December last year.
Amir has been skeptical of the way his career was managed by the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) on numerous occasions. He once again took an indirect jibe at the team management over its handling of the situation by citing the example of Jasprit Bumrah and how the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) handled his form issues.
“I think it is not the right mindset to look at performance of only four or five matches. If you remember, [Jasprit] Bumrah had only one wicket in 16 matches when he was playing Australia series but nobody questioned him because they knew that he is a match-winning bowler. That was the time they [Indian team management] should have supported him and they did that,” said Amir.
“You are given the job to help the player when he is not performing and not just discard him from the side. If it’s like this, then we should give you an entire team made up of players like Cristiano Ronaldo so that you can sit back and relax and do nothing,” he added.
There are speculations of Amir’s return from retirement too but the left-arm speedster ruled out having been upset with some of the statements made by the management against him.
“If it was only about my performance, I would have never taken the decision about retirement. But their [team management] statements about me regarding my retirement from Test cricket really hurt me. I have no personal issue with them as they are my elders and legends of the game,” he concluded.
Having played 36 Tests, 61 ODIs and 50 T20Is, Amir alleged that he was ‘pushed away’ by Pakistan and the entire situation left him with no other option but to announce retirement.
