In a big announcement from the Pakistan Cricket Board on Saturday, Shahid Afridi was appointed as chairman in an interim capacity of the National men's selection committee. His first assignment will be for the home series against New Zealand. The committee also features the likes of Abdul Razaq, the former Pakistan cricketer, and Rao Iftikhar Anjum, who will constitute the panel. The committee will be managed by Haroon Rashid.
“I welcome the interim Men’s National Selection Committee and have no doubts that despite limited time, they will make brave and bold decisions that will help us produce a strong and competitive side in the series against New Zealand,” Najam Sethi, PCB management committee chair, said in a statement.
“Shahid Afridi has been an attacking cricketer who played all his cricket with no fear. He has nearly 20 years of cricket experience, has featured in all formats with significant success and more importantly, has always backed and supported young talent."
In a sharp response to the appointment of Afridi as selector, Danish Kaneria, the former Pakistan spinner, has put out a tweet. He shared a picture of Afridi when he was caught ball tampering, or “smelling the ball”, in Afridi’s words. The picture was captioned by Kameria as “Chief Selector" with the laughing emojis.
Here is the tweet -
Chief selector 😂😂😂 pic.twitter.com/cdKokzJCyR
— Danish Kaneria (@DanishKaneria61) December 25, 2022
Afridi and Kaneria have not seen eye to eye and have not had the best equations with each other. Kaneria is one of the few Hindu cricketers to have represented Pakistan and he has always believed that he has been treated unfairly by the Pakistan Cricket Board. Kaneria, a while back, had even requested the Indian Cricket Board to help him get back into cricket when he could not represent Pakistan on a regular basis, but such attempts were to no avail.
Twitter was abuzz, let us take a look at the reactions here -
cheap selector
— shubham mehta 🇮🇳 (@shubhmehta33) December 25, 2022
TV phodo expert hai ,isko Chief Selector bana rahe hai ..
— BLUE PILGRIM Vinod S Nair 🇮🇳 (@nairnrc) December 25, 2022
🤣🤣🤣🤣
Pakistan ko selectors ki kya zaroorat jab ghoom phirke wahi bande khelne hai
— ℛ𝒶𝓀ℯ𝓈𝒽 🐅 (@Spenses01) December 25, 2022
This is gonna get interesting.
— Richard lobo (@knockyouout31) December 25, 2022
Vese jo Afridi kar rha hai pic mein vo fair game hai????😂😂😜
— Aditya Sharma (@_Aditya1102) December 25, 2022
No surprise, he will teach more players to temper ball.
— Shrawan chachar 🇮🇳 (@shrawanchachar) December 25, 2022
🤣🤣🤣
— Raju Pyne (@PyneRaju) December 25, 2022
😂😂
— 𝓟𝓻𝓲𝓽𝔂 𝓢𝓱𝓪𝓻𝓶𝓪 (@DimagMtKhaa) December 25, 2022
Pak : pic.twitter.com/3QctKmPrfl
— Av (@Akashv45) December 25, 2022
Hutiya duckfridi 🤣🤣
— Gaurav (@Ab_____d) December 25, 2022