Mohammad Hafeez opens up on resting Shaheen Afridi in SCG Test

Listen to Story Head coach Mohammad Hafeez opened up on the reasons behind leaving out Shaheen Shah Afridi in Pakistan’s third and final Test against Australia at the Sydney Cricket Ground. Pakistan, captained by Shan Masood, made 2 changes for the SCG Test, one of which was bringing in off spinner Sajid Khan for Shaheen.

Hafeez, also Pakistan’s men’s team director, said that the 23 year old Shaheen was rested to “manage his workload”. "We took the decision to rest Shaheen and manage his workload because we didn't want his body to be adversely affected. In the last one year since his return from injury, he has worked hard, and the workload on him has been massive.

We wanted to give him a break and manage his workload,” Hafeez was quoted as saying in the post match press conference. Hafeez said that it is necessary to ensure that players’ careers aren’t spoiled because of workload not being managed properly. “I don't know what's happened previously, but at this time, I wanted to make sure that no bowler's career is spoiled due to their workload not being managed," he added.

During the Sydney Test, Shaheen also said that it was the to bench him for the last match of the series. In the two matches that he played in Perth and Melbourne, Shaheen picked up eight wickets at an economy rate of 3.35. His best figures of 27 4 76 4 came in the second Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, where he dismissed Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Steve Smith and Mitchell Starc.

Pakistan, on Saturday, lost the third Test by eight wickets and lost the 3 match series 0 3. They also lost their 17th Test match in a row on Australian soil..