Babar Azam's days as Pakistan's white-ball captain could be numbered, with wicketkeeper-batsman Mohammad Rizwan emerging as the candidate to lead the team in ODIs and T20Is -- according to Geo News.
The likely development comes soon after Babar's recent batting failures in the home Test series against Bangladesh, which the hosts embarrassingly lost 2-0. In contrast, Mohammad Rizwan was Pakistan's most prolific batsmen across two Tests.
Rizwan led the series' batting charts with a tally of 294 runs in four innings at an average of 98.0 and a highest of 171 not out. He also scored a half-century. In contrast, Babar aggregated a mere 64 runs at an average of 16.00, with a highest of 31.
Babar has not been given the chance to lead in the upcoming Champions Cup, where Rizwan, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Shadab Khan, Mohammad Haris and Saud Shakeel will lead their respective teams.
It could be an indication towards the way Pakistan Cricket Board is looking to take things forward as the country tries to resurrect its cricket.
As per the Geo News report, "there was a fair chance of appointment of a new captain in place of the star batsman (Babar) later this year. The appointment of a new skipper for one-day international and T20 formats was likely ahead of the Australia tour, slated for November".
The report also states that Pakistan's "white-ball Head Coach Gary Kirsten had talked to the cricket board officials and captain himself in July in this regard."
It is also likely that Rizwan will be handed captaincy for all three formats, which means Shan Masood's job as Test skipper is also on the line.
Babar relinquished Pakistan captaincy after a disastrous ODI World Cup campaign last year, but was reappointed for white-ball formats in March this year after just one series as captain for Shaheen Afridi. Masood was named the Test captain.
Before their first ever Test series defeat against Bangladesh, Pakistan were eliminated from the T20 World Cup in the group stage itself.
