The Hindu : Sport / Cricket : Razzaq didn’t take practice seriously: Rana

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Friday, Aug 24, 2007
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Razzaq didn’t take practice seriously: Rana

Karachi: All-rounder Abdul Razzaq was dropped for the Twenty20 World Cup because he didn’t take the practice matches seriously, Pakistan’s national selector Shafqat Rana has claimed.

Replying to accusations of ignoring merit, Rana argued that no player could be picked on basis of popularity or past performances and said that the Pakistan squad had been picked on merit according to the requirements of the tournament.

Claiming that the selectors had no grudges against any player, Rana said: “The board did try to contact the senior players to take them into confidence but none of them bothered to respond to these calls, so they shouldn’t complain of the board not showing respect for them.”

However, Rana didn’t bother to explain if these calls were made before dropping the senior players or afterwards.

Razzaq and record breaking batsman Mohammad Yousuf were the shock omissions for the upcoming tournament.

Despite claims that merit was the only factor behind the selectors’ decision, they have been unable to justify the preference of batsman, Misbah-ul-Haq over Yousuf in the team.

Rana also said the dropped players were unnecessarily making an issue of their exclusion, pointing out that other countries had also rested some of their senior players for the Twenty20 World Cup. — PTI

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