KalPoint.com (KPDC): Please share something about yourself, your education, family background and brought up?

Mr. Salahuddin Ahmed – Salloo (SAS): I was born in India. We then migrated to Pakistan. Cricket was not new to me and my family. My brothers used to play cricket. My father was a tennis captain in 1928. So, my family was very much involved in sports.

My paternal grandfather Maulana Abdul Majid was a religious cleric. Interestingly, the former test cricketer, Majid Khan was named after my grandfather. He had the honor to translate Qura’n. He had also written “Tafseer-e-Majidi”. My mother belongs to Qidwai family, which has a broad political background in India. My maternal grand father Rafi Ahmed Qidwai, used to be with Nehru. My sister had been federal minister in India and now-a-days she is a Rajia-Sabha (Indian Senate) member. My uncle is working as the governor of Chandigarh, Punjab.

I was in DJ Science College in 1965. After doing my BSC from SM Science College, I went to Scotland and I lived there for 13 years. I played cricket for different teams during that period as a professional cricketer.

I made my Test debut after only six first-class matches at the age of 18. I also used to contribute to the bowling attack with slow offbreaks. I had a short career, but continued to score heavily in domestic cricket. Then I became selector in 1980-82 and in 1986 Karachi won Quaid-a-Azam trophy, Patrons Trophy & U-19 Tournament under my chairmanship of selectors.

I have also been the chairman of KCCA for 10 years. I always believe that Karachi is full of talented players. I have always tried to work honestly and make the selection on merit. There are 7 zones in Karachi. The selection is made on the basis of open-trials. At that time, Saeed Anwar, Asif Mujtaba, Zahid Fazal, Azhar Khan and Saleem Jaffer were introduced to national level. Then we discovered Shahid Afridi and Moin Khan among many others. I believe that talent is something which no one can stop or conceal.

I also discovered Saqlain Mushtaq. He was the bowler who invented ‘doosra’, which the Sri Lankan off-spinner Muarlitharan has been using as a deadly weapon. I told the then chairman PCB about Saqlain’s ability. The Chairman agreed and he decided to include Saqlain into the squad. But I was dismissed after that. It happened a few times with me. But I always believe that it’s better to quit than doing your work dishonestly. The problem is that when you take a stand in this country you put yourself into trouble. But I feel no regrets because I believe in honesty and commitment to my work.


KPDC: Are you satisfied with the current selection process?

SAS: I am totally satisfied with the current setup. Both my colleagues, Saleem Jaffer and Shafqat Rana are very honest with their work. We select Pakistan ‘A’ team and the National Team. The junior teams like Under-19 and Academy teams are selected by the Junior Selection Committee which is working under the chairmanship of Colonel Noshaad.

There is sufficient talent in our country and if we work honestly we can bring the talent up. For selection purpose, we have to consider a number of factors. For instance, not only that we have to see the runs scored by a batsman, but we also need to look at the bowling attack against which the runs have been scored as well as the pitch conditions.

I would like mention here that historically we get fast bowlers from Punjab, and the batsmen from Karachi because of the nature of pitches and other factors in these regions.


KPDC: There are reports that previously, the selectors didn’t use to visit the grounds to see the player’s performance; they used to make decisions on the basis of factors other than performance. How would you comment on this?

SAS: This had been the issue in the past but we are paid selectors. So we are working as full time selectors. Therefore, we make sure that one of our selectors is present wherever any important match is played. Because it’s very essential for the selectors to see how the players are performing on field. Since we are accountable for the selection process, we try to make it as transparent and accurate as we can.

Moreover, we also get feedback from the referee who keeps eye on the matches. We think a referee is good source of information about the player’s on-field conduct and performance. We also remain in consultancy with the junior selection committee. They suggest us about the players in which they see potentials.


KPDC: Why do you think Pakistan is struggling in the department of spin bowling?

SAS: It’s true that Pakistan is not getting quality spinners. Kaneria has not performed the way he should have been. Let me tell you that in England there are no wrist spinners because the ball is wet. Finger spinners are more useful generally. I told Kaneria to use his fingers more effectively. Shane Warne, Mushtaq Ahmed and other spinners have used their fingers well. We are looking for new talented spinners; one that we have discovered is Yasir Shah. He is from Swabi and has shown great talent. He has also played against Zimbabwe. So we are hopeful that Pakistan will find quality spinners in the future to strengthen its bowling attack.


KPDC: How effective do you think academies have been in Pakistan?

SAS: I think some of the academies are dong a splendid job. Especially Rashid is doing a great work through his academy. He has producing some very talented cricketers. He is one of the cricketers who have the knowledge about the game. Rashid is the one who introduced Younis Khan. I have seen his academy and I found that he has put a lot of hard work to his academy.


KPDC: Pakistan Cricket team has been facing opening problems for quite a long time now. Don’t you think it’s disappointing that Pakistan has not been able to find good openers? Do you have any names to fill up the space?

SAS: We are working hard to give quality openers to Pakistan team. We have one batsman who is established as an opener, i.e., Salman Butt. He is an excellent choice for ODI, Test and 20/20 cricket. We are facing problems in finding the other opener. In ODI we open with Kamran Akmal because it helps the team to include a sixth bowler. In Test matches, however, we do struggle to find a good opening pair.

At the moment, I see openers like Nasir Jamshed, Khalid Latif and Khurram Manzoor as great prospects for Pakistani team. We think that Khalid Latif will be better for Test cricket.

We also gave chances to openers like Muhammad Hafeez, Imran Nazir, Imran Farhat, and Taufiq Umar. But they couldn’t perform consistently. Muhammad Hafeez is a good player technically. Imran Nazir is one of the best fielders in Pakistan.

Our job is to provide the best players to the team management. To polish the player’s talent and to give them exposure is the job of the coach. Moreover, I also feel that a good captain is a psychologist too; he has the ability to know how to make the players perform.


KPDC: How do you see the future of players who played ICL?

SAS: If the Pakistan Cricket Board decides to lift the ban on the players who joined ICL, It’s possible that these players may play the domestic Cricket. If the ban is lifted, the selection committee will also consider these players for the national team. But it all depends on PCB’s decision. I believe Imran Farhat and Shabbir Ahmed are good players and they can be considered for the national team provided the ban is lifted. Farhat is a good opener. I had sent him the message that if he doesn’t join ICL he will surely be considered for the test series. But he joined ICL and has been criticizing me for not selecting him.

ICL is like the Kerry Pecker series, which started as a result of TV rights dispute. Afterwards, when Channel-9 was given the rights, the Kerry Pecker wiped out. Here we see ICL v/s IPL. I believe that Indian Cricket Board is so strong that ICL might die out in the near future. IPL is more successful than ICL because of the more money and the recognition.


KPDC: Most of the people are of the opinion that Shahid Afridi should be played as an opener but he is mostly sent in as number 6 or 7. How would you defend this decision?

SAS: The batting order is established by the team management. We can’t interfere in this decision. I personally feel we can open with Afridi where there is low bounce in the wicket and where the target is 300+. There are some conditions where the idea is to keep wickets in hand in the first 10 overs, so we can’t open with Afridi in such a scenario. Also in countries like England we can’t open with a player like Afridi due to the pitch nature. Generally I think Afridi is better at number 6 or 7. He has not been in a good form for the last few seasons. This can happen to any player. Even players like Gary Sobers and Zaheer Abbas had faced lack of form.


KPDC: The selection committee has been criticized for not playing young players in the series against Bangladesh. How would you defend it?

SAS: We did experiment with some new players in the series against Bangladesh but its true that we didn’t play too many young players. Actually we didn’t take Bangladesh lightly because we believe that Bangladesh has players like Ashraful and Tamim Iqbal who can win matches for their team. But fortunately for Pakistan none of them clicked. We didn’t use a large number of new players in this series because we didn’t want to take any risks.


KPDC: Why Fawad Alam is not selected in the national team?

SAS: Actually, in the home series we give the list of 15 or 16 players and also we provide the final 11 players. When the team goes abroad, there is a tour selection committee that selects the final 11 according to the situation and ground conditions. This committee consists of coach, manager, captain and a senior member, usually the vice captain.

Moreover, the batting order is planned by the team management. For example, when Naumanullah, who had scored 1236 runs in domestic cricket, was given chance during a match in home series, he was sent at number 8 by the team management. This also discourages the new comers. I believe that new comers should be given proper chance.


KPDC: How do you see the performance of Kamran Akmal?

SAS: Now-a-days, there is a trend of including a keeper in the side who has excellent batting skills. This trend started with Sangakkara and Gilchrist. The team management believes that when they play Kamran Akmal as opener, we have an option of playing a sixth bowler. That’s why, they go for Kamran. That’s what most of the teams are doing. However, I believe that first priority should be keeping. If a keeper is not keeping the wicket well, then he should not be selected just because he is good at batting.


KPDC: What future do you see for Abdul Razzaq and Azhar Mahmood?

SAS: I think Abdul Razzaq has disappointed us. He played 12 20/20 matches and he could only take 5 wickets. He didn’t do well with the bat as well. I asked him to put efforts in his bowling. He might be ill but he should let us know about his illness because when he steps into the stadium everyone demands performance from him. He was dropped because of his performance.

As far as Azhar Mahmood is concerned, we do not consider him for selection because we believe that Sohail Tanvir is a better prospect for us than Abdul Razzaq and Azhar Mahmood. We could be wrong but we feel that we should focus on the future. He impressed us a lot in the net. So we selected him and sent him to 20/20 World Cup. He has an unorthodox style of bowling. This perception is wrong that once batsmen started to recognize his style, Sohail Tanvir will get hammered. The only problem that we see with Sohail Tanvir is that his fielding is not up to the mark.


KPDC: What message you would like to convey to the youth of Pakistan?

SAS: My message to all the people is ‘Always try hard and respect your parents’. Try to make your mother happy as much as possible. I believe that when a mother prays for her child, no one on earth can stop her child from being successful. Therefore, I would request all the people to recognize the worth of their mothers. Always keep her happy.
 


 

Question: Will the performance of the players in IPL be considered for future team? If yes, would you consider Shoaib as he has performed tremendously well recently? If no, don’t you think it’s an international platform and it does worth it? (Saim Rashid, Karachi)

SAS: I don’t think the performance in the IPL will exclusively be considered for the selection of national team. However, IPL will help the selection process because there are many new players who come into action in the 20/20. Like, I have seen a number of talented young Indian players during IPL. Similarly we are trying to find youngsters from our country. For this we are planning to arrange Pakistan Premier League (PPL) which would help youngsters to display their talent.

As far as Shoaib Akhter is considered, he is an asset to Pakistan Cricket team. So, if he is fit and available for Pakistan team, he is sure to be selected for the Pakistani team. Unfortunately, Shaoib has some problems, if he manages to overcome these problems he would be an obvious choice for Pakistan cricket team. As far as other players are concerned, Shaoib Malik, Younis, and Misbah are the obvious members of national team. I also believe that discipline should be given utmost priority.

Question: How would you comment on the performance of Shoaib Malik as captain of Pakistan Cricket Team? Is there any plan to replace him? (Anas Rehman, London)

SAS: Firstly, the captain, manager, Vice Captain and Coach are appointed by the Pakistan Cricket Board. Selection Committee has to do nothing with it. As far as Shoaib’s performance in concerned, I would tell you that we have 4 all rounders at the moment; Shahid Afridi, Shaoib Malik, Sohail Tanvir and Fawad Alam. We are not depending on them only but we are looking for many other players. For example, we have discovered bowlers as a backup for our current bowling attack. These young bowlers also include Sohail Khan from Karachi and Wahab Riaz from Punjab.

Malik is a good player, a good allrounder. His captaincy has also improved. But one thing is that Malik doesn’t have the kind of resources that Imran khan had in the past. Today we don’t have players of that caliber.

Question: What impact do you think IPL will make on international cricket? Some people say it will damage the Test Cricket. Do you agree? (Sultan Ali, Lahore)

SAS: We can say that IPL is just like CBFS used to hold tournaments in Sharjah. IPL will have some strong impact on incarnation cricket because everyone will be attracted to it. Players will now retire much earlier from international cricket because of the money involved in IPL. It can affect ODI cricket but I don’t think it would make any adverse affect on Test Cricket because Test Cricket is the real cricket.

Twenty-20 will affect the 50/50 because of the money involved in IPL. Another thing is that 20/20 starts mostly after 6pm, when people have time to see these matches.

Twenty-20 can also help players for their ODI because they can get more experience of playing the last 20 over in the 50 over match.

Question: There are many players who have shown great temperament but are not being considered for the national team. Asim Kamal is one of them. How would you comment on it? (Raheem Daad, Karachi)

SAS: I like Asim Kamal because he has great skills. But unfortunately, he has not shown great commitment. I would like to mention that we had arranged three training camps. In Lahore, when we called him he said I am suffering from Malaria, so he went back to Karachi. In the 2nd camp, held in Abbotabad, was arranged by Army. It was a fitness camp, but he returned back from that camp too. The third camp held in Karachi, was arranged for World Cup 20/20. We called him but he went to offer Umrah. So, how can we consider such a player who is not available for the camp? But recently he has participated in Grade-2 in which he represented Port Qasim. I hope we can consider him for future series.

KPDC: Thank you so much for being here and enlightening us with your thoughts. C U on Net.

SAS: I also enjoyed being here. C U On Net 2.

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