Pakistan Cricket Board on Wednesday appointed Misbah-ul-Haq as the coach of the national team alongwith giving him the responsibility of a chief selector. The former captain will also be reunited with Waqar Younis who has been appointed the bowling coach. Waqar was head coach twice during Misbah’s tenure as captain for close to seven years.
Both former players have been handed a three-year contracts and the first assignment for the duo will be three-ODI and three T20I home series against Sri Lanka which begins September 27. Their first Test match, part of the World Test Championship, will be in Australia, where Pakistan will play in Brisbane from November 21, followed by a day/night Test in Adelaide from November 29.
Misbah will be replacing Mickey Arthur, the previous head coach, who was released after the World Cup 2019. Waqar Younis will take over from Azhar Mahmood.
The decision was taken by PCB’s five-member panel with two independent former cricketers - Intikhab Alam and Bazid Khan - as well as governing board member Asad Ali Khan, Wasim Khan and Zakir Khan.
PCB did not shortlist any candidate for the role of the batting coach despite two applicants – Mohammad Wasim and Faisal Iqbal.
The cricket board had actively chased Misbah to take up the role. The cricketer, however, did not show keen interest at the beginning before applying for the job hours before the deadline. Pakistan’s most successful captain beat Dean Jones and Moshin Khan for the job.
This will be Waqar Younis’ fifth term with Pakistan in coach role. Previously, he had served as the bowling coach of the side in 2006-07, bowling and fielding coach in 2009-10, head coach in 2010-11 and from 2014 to 2016. He left after a poor show by the team in World T20, resigning three months before his contract expired.