The PCB has asked Misbah-ul-Haq to keep retirement plans on hold and play on through Pakistan’s tours of England and Australia next year. Pakistan are scheduled to tour England for four Tests in 2016, and then to Australia for three Tests in the 2016-17 season. Misbah will be 42 next year. “We have told him to delay his retirement for a year if he is thinking on those lines,” Shaharyar Khan, the PCB chairman, told mediapersons in Lahore. “We feel his presence as captain and senior player will be invaluable to the team for the Test tours to England and Australia next year.” Misbah confirmed to ESPNcricinfo that Shaharyar had spoken to him. Earlier this month, he had hinted that the series against England in the UAE – which Pakistan currently lead 1-0 with one Test left to play – might be his last, particularly since the proposed series against India in December looked unlikely to go ahead. Misbah, 41, is Pakistan’s most successful Test captain, with 19 wins. He is retired from the shorter formats, but has shown no signs of waning form or fitness in the five-day game. He averages 56.75 in his 41 Tests as captain, all of which have come since his 36th birthday, and has made scores of 3, 51, 102 and 87 in his four innings so far in the series against England. It was in the aftermath of the 2010 spot-fixing scandal that Misbah was asked to take up the reins. He immediately responded with not just impressive scores, but the team seemed to rally around him as well, ushering in an era of consolidation and relative serenity. As Misbah guided his troops in camps set up away from home, fans in Pakistan revelled in one of the most successful and consistent runs of captaincy. Quietly, Misbah became the country’s most successful Test captain, losing three series in a record otherwise worthy of an award nomination. Granted that Pakistan has not played England, Australia or India in their conditions over the last five years, but that isn’t Misbah’s fault. Whitewashing England and scoring Test cricket’s fastest century against Australia was more than what fans bargained for. Misbah has shown that he is a hero — perhaps not someone Pakistan deserved, but definitely the one we needed. He is nothing less than the Dark Knight of Pakistan cricket, a messiah who has guided the team out of hopeless positions into the peaceful shores of uncelebrated victories.
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