‘Gary Kirsten broke his contract with PCB, made some breaches’: Mohsin Naqvi | Cricket News
Pakan Cricket Board Chairman Mohsin Naqvi refuted reports that South African Gary Kirsten had resigned as head coach of the white-ball team due to a rift with the PCB after the coaches were stripped of their powers in selection matters. Naqvi said that Kirsten had ended the contract with the board and not the other way round.
“He (Kirsten) broke his contract with the PCB and made some breaches. He ended the contract with us,” Naqvi revealed to the media.
Naqvi also said that the PCB had started the process of finding a new head coach of the white ball team and he had already spoken to some 4-5 candidates.
“We will have a new white ball head coach the end of this month because Jason Gillispie has only agreed to manage the team in Australia for the white ball matches on an interim basis. He is more focussed on his role as red ball head coach,” Naqvi said. “The team will have a new white ball coach for the Zimbabwe tour.”
Pakan won the Test series against England after a turnaround, but Kirsten’s exit was eye-popping, considering he leaves without coaching Pakan in a single ODI, a format he is known to have aced and even won a World Cup in, as coach.
Kirsten was on loggerheads and tensions brewed when captain Mohammad Rizwan was announced as white-ball captain in Lahore, with PCB chairman Naqvi and members of the selection committee present.
Pakan had earlier announced a new selection panel—their third in three months, comprising Aaqib Javed, Aleem Dar, Azhar Ali, Asad Shafiq, and Hassan Cheema, which excluded coaches and the captain from matters of selection. Moreover, Aaquib was seen as the face of their Test turnaround against England with Cricinfo quoting Rizwan as lauding the success as ‘Aquiball’.
Kirsten’s exit came after Pakan’s horror showing in the T20 World Cup in the America’s and Caribbean, their earliest exit from any ICC tournament.