Pakistan’s veteran batsman Babar Azam has come under fire for his sub-par performances in recent times. Azam’s underwhelming performances come at a time when Pakistan cricket is going through a lean patch, having been knocked out of both the T20 and ODI World Cups last year, leading to increased attacks on one of Pakistan’s modern greats.
In a recent spate of attacks, Azam has been targeted with a barrage of memes and fake posts suggesting that the veteran batsman has retired from international cricket. The first fake retirement post began circulating on social media on Monday, and the message was very similar to how a player might announce his retirement, leading many people to believe it was a post from Babar’s original X account.
As the initial post gained traction on social media, a number of other fake retirement posts began to circulate.
Babar Azam’s lean patch:
Babar Azam has been going through a lean patch for the last 12 months or so with the latest realization of that coming in recently concluded Test series against Bangladesh. In the four innings across 2 Test matches against Bangladesh, Azam scored 64 runs, leading to widespread criticism.
In his last 10 innings, Azam has scored 190 runs in 10 Test innings at an average of 19 and his ODI average has also dipped to 19 to in the ODIs. Azam’s T20 average, however, is a lit bit better at 38 but he hasn’t been able to score big runs in recent times.
However, despite the ongoing lean patch, Azam continues to enjoy the confidence of current Test coach of Pakistan, Jason Gillispie. The former Aussie great while speaking about Azam recently said, “Babar is a quality player. He is a world-class player. He is very close. I feel it. I am confident that we are going to see Babar scoring some big runs very soon. He probably hasn’t converted the start he has got,”