Pakistan have not picked Fakhar Zaman for the third T20I against Bangladesh in Mirpur today (July 24).
Pakistan made two changes to their lineup for the third and final match of the series, bringing in Sahibzada Farhan for Fakhar and Hussain Talat for Khushdil Shah. The move came as a bit of a surprise given Fakhar's performance in the first match, where he made 44 off 34 even as Pakistan were bowled out for 110.
In fact, Fakhar's 44 in the first game was the only instance of a top-six Pakistan batter getting into double digits across the first two matches of the series. In the second game, the left-handed opener was dismissed for eight off eight balls.
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Why have Pakistan dropped Fakhar Zaman?
On the face of it, there's little justification for Pakistan dropping Fakhar from the XI. Since the start of 2024, he has been their third-highest run-scorer in the format after Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan, both of whom now find themselve out of the T20I setup. Fakhar's 468 runs in this period have come at an average of 26 and a strike rate of 147.16.
With Pakistan going through a transition period following the onboarding of Mike Hesson as head coach, they have looked to change up their brand of T20I cricket, giving fresh faces a go. That, along with the fact that they have already lost the three-match series after the first two games, could have prompted them into giving Sahibzada Farhan some game time. However, the choice to bench Fakhar for Farhan has been met with criticism, with people pointing out the poor form of other batters in the team like Saim Ayub.
Ayub, Fakhar's opening partner in the first two matches, recorded scores of six and one, and was dismissed for 21 off 15 in the third game, making it just the second time he made it into double-digits from six T20Is this year.
However, Ayub has age on his side, and if the idea was just to test out bench-strength, not leaving out the youngster when he's going through a rough patch, over the 35-year-old veteran, would perhaps have been the more prudent move anyway. On the other hand, Farhan justified his selection with a 29-ball 50 and was batting on 56 off 35 balls at the time of writing.
Another call that has irked Pakistan fans is the non-selection of left-arm wrist-spinner Sufiyan Muqeem, who has not featured in the XI in any of the three games in this series despite being part of the squad. Pakistan have instead preferred the left-arm finger-spinning duo of Mohammad Nawaz and Khushdil Shah.
There hasn't been any official communication yet from the Pakistan side on either of those two selection decisions.
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