Shan Masood, Jason Gillespie call for more Test cricket for Pakistan

“If I’m being brutally honest, in home Test matches, because they’ve been played at different times of the year and against different nations, we still haven’t found our ideal way of playing at home that suits our batting, bowling, and overall style.”

Shan Masood

Those series – as well as an earlier one with Australia – were played on lifeless surfaces, in stark contrast to the livelier ones when Tests first returned. With a new curator – Tony Hemming – in place, that will be under scrutiny again this season.

“In Test cricket, which is the ultimate challenge in the game, you have to be familiar with certain conditions,” Masood said. “Yes, we’ve been playing at home since 2019, but other teams have been playing on their home soils for much longer. We still have to decide what our best approach at home is.

“If I’m being brutally honest, in home Test matches, because they’ve been played at different times of the year and against different nations, we still haven’t found our ideal way of playing at home that suits our batting, bowling, and overall style. That’s something we need to quickly figure out.

“We need to determine what helps us win as a team. How can we create conditions that suit us more and put us in the driving seat, rather than just thinking about how we can cope with the opposition?”

There is evidence, as Masood pointed out, that Pakistan have competed reasonably well in more challenging conditions, where they’ve been able to rely on their fast bowlers, but Gillespie said it’s still early in terms of figuring out and settling on an identity.

“I think the identity will sort itself out. In this next period of time, seven Test matches out of nine are in Pakistan, which is fantastic,” Gillespie said. “I echo Shan’s sentiments – it would be great to play more Test cricket. The PCB is exploring ways to have more Shaheens (Pakistan A) games and four-day cricket to bridge the gap between domestic and international cricket. As for identity and playing in Pakistan, there are varying surfaces and conditions depending on whether you’re in the north or south of the country. I don’t think that will be resolved right now. It will be a process to figure out exactly what surfaces we want to play on going forward.

“But I firmly believe we’ve got all bases covered, whether it’s fast bowling, slower bowling, or playing on faster, bouncier tracks that offer more assistance to seamers, or surfaces that are lower and slower. We need to be flexible and adaptable, but we’ll certainly have a basic blueprint on how we want to play our games.”

Pakistan’s upcoming series has already meant that workload management has been an issue. A spate of top players, including Babar Azam, Mohammad Rizwan, Shaheen Shah Afridi and Naseem Shah, were not given NOCs to play in leagues. Gillespie admitted it was a challenge to balance the demands of playing for Pakistan against separate financial opportunities on offer. But he said the priority, especially for the multi-format players, was to play for Pakistan.

“There are challenges, no question,” he said. “We want to find the balance between representing Pakistan and not denying players opportunities for experiences. There are financial incentives for players to go and play overseas. I know there’s been a lot of media discussion recently about some decisions made by the PCB on player availability. Shan touched on it – there are nine Test matches in the next four months.

“That’s just Test cricket. There’s domestic cricket, white-ball cricket in the 50-over and T20 formats, not just in Pakistan but all around the world.

“We’ve got multi-format players, and we’ve got to look after them as best we can. The priority is representing Pakistan, but if there are opportunities -on a case-by-case basis – where a player can learn about their game and play better cricket, which in turn will help them be a better cricketer for Pakistan, then we’ll certainly consider those opportunities. But we won’t be in a position where we compromise the team, whichever format.”

Osman Samiuddin is a senior editor at ESPNcricinfo