Gary Kirsten, former South Africa cricketer and a renowned coach, has revealed how his lack of authority as Pakistan’s white-ball coach forced him to step down.
Kirsten took over Pakistan’s white-ball coaching in April 2024, at the same time when Jason Gillespie was also hired as the team’s new Test coach. However, just six months into his job, Kirsten submitted his resignation amid a reported power rift between him and the Pakistan Cricket Board. Kirsten parted ways with the team a day after Pakistan’s squads for last year’s ODI and T20I tours of Australia and Zimbabwe were announced.
Kirsten and Gillespie were both removed from the new five-member selection panel Pakistan named for choosing the squads for the second and third Test of the 2024 series against England, and ODI and T20I squads for the Australia and Zimbabwe tour.
Speaking on the Wisden Cricket Patreon podcast, Kirsten shed light on the power struggle between him and the board, citing it as the sticking point that led to his early departure as Pakistan’s white-ball coach.
"It was a tumultuous few months. I realised quite quickly I wasn’t going to have much of an influence. Once I was taken off selection and asked to take a team and not be able to shape the team, it became very difficult as a coach then to have any sort of positive influence on the group," Kirsten said.
Just months later, Gillespie, who had overseen Australia’s victorious ODI tour, stepped down as Pakistan’s Test coach ahead of the South Africa Test series in December. Later, he revealed that Pakistan’s decision to part ways with high-performance coach Tim Nielsen influenced his choice not to continue as Test team coach. He went on to say that the experience left a sour taste in his coaching career.
Kirsten: I'd go back to Pakistan if invited, but under right circumstances
Kirsten, however, has not ruled out the possibility of coaching Pakistan again "under the right circumstances" and without "influential noise".
"If I got invited back to Pakistan tomorrow, I would go, but I would want to go for the players, and I would want to go under the right circumstances," he said.
"Cricket teams need to be run by cricket people. When that’s not happening and when there’s a lot of noise from the outside that’s very influential noise, it’s very difficult for leaders within the team to walk a journey that you feel like you need to walk in order to take this team to where it needs to go.
"I’m too old now to be dealing with other agendas, I just want to coach a cricket team, work with the players – I love the Pakistan players, they’re great guys. I had a very short period of time with them and I feel for them. More than any other team in the world, they feel the pressure of performance massively, when they lose it’s hectic for them and they feel that.
"But they’re professional cricketers and I’m a professional cricket coach. When we get into that environment, there are generally certain things you do to help a team be the best that they can be, and when there’s no interference, you go down the road, and if it’s a talented group of guys, you’re generally going to have success."
Aaqib Javed was the interim head coach for Pakistan following Kirsten's departure. He has now been replaced by the New Zealander Mike Hesson who has taken over as head coach for the white-ball formats. Pakistan currently don't have a designated red-ball head coach.
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