Karachi: The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) has appointed former all-rounder Yasir Arafat as the high-performance coach of the national team for the upcoming five-match T20 series against New Zealand on their home turf starting from January 12.
Yasir, who is in London, will fly back to his home country and will leave with Pakistan’s white ball squad, which has been already announced by the PCB. The PCB is eyeing the big picture as they looking at it as a game practice, considering the ICC T20 World Cup, which will be held in the West Indies and the USA, is just six months away. The Pakistan selectors have already announced a 17-member squad for the T20 series in New Zealand.
Yasir, who was part of Pakistan’s 2007 T20 World Cup squad, had applied for the bowling coach post earlier this year, but PCB approached Mickey Arthur, who took over as the head coach.
A PCB source said that Yasir will replace Simon Helmut, who is the high-performance coach of the Pakistan team for the ongoing Test series in Australia. "Yasir's appointment came about on the recommendation of the national team's director Muhammad Hafeez, who is calling the shots in Australia even above captain, Shah Masood," the source claimed.
Yasir, who appeared in three Tests, 11 ODIs and 13 T20s, was a member of the Pakistan squad that won the ICC World T20 in England in 2009. This will be the fifth appointment of a coach with the Pakistan team since Hafeez was named the team's director.
Hafeez has seen the appointments of Umar Gul and Saeed Ajmal as the team's fast and spin bowling coaches and then the short-term appointments of Adam Hollioake and Simon Helmut as batting coach and high-performance coach of the team in Australia for the three-Test series. Pakistan lost the first Test against Australia at Perth, while the second Test will be played at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in Melbourne from December 26.
Also read
