Miandad vs Imran Khan: Politics That Broke Pakistan Cricket | Inside Story

Javed Miandad and Imran Khan—two legends of Pakistani cricket. The relationship between these two cricketers, who played together for the Pakistan team from 1975 to 1992, is deep and complex even off the field. Miandad has written a lot about the relationship in the book ‘Cutting Edge: My Autobiography’. In the chapter ‘Imran and I’, he praises the World Cup-winning captain, but in the chapter ‘A Difficult Retirement’, he presents a different Imran. Today, the next part is for the readers.

What Javed Miandad wrote

After the 1992 World Cup victory, I became the captain of Pakistan in place of Imran Khan. I knew the Pakistan team better than anyone else, I also had a plan for where I wanted to take the team in the next few years. My goal was to use all my experience to continue our success.

After the World Cup success, the Pakistan team won the five-match Test series in England by a margin of 2-1 under my leadership. Then I went to New Zealand, where we won the only Test of the series in Hamilton. I scored 92 runs in that match.

My thoughts were on the future of Pakistan cricket. I was looking forward to an uninterrupted captaincy, and to the opportunity to further strengthen the foundations that Imran and I had laid for Pakistan cricket in the previous decade.

But after returning from New Zealand, I found a completely different atmosphere in the Pakistan Cricket Board. When I met the top officials of the board, their attitude was negative. No one said anything positive about my leadership or my future. It didn't take Einstein to understand that I was no longer the board's preferred captain.

There was a move to replace me with Wasim Akram as the new captain of Pakistan. The source of this move can ultimately be traced back to Imran, whose influence in the Pakistan Cricket Board was still very strong. Imran was close to all the top officials of the board (including the chairman and secretary). He was also formally appointed as an advisor to the Pakistan Cricket Board.

I don’t know what Imran’s motives were; I can only speculate. Perhaps he felt that Miandad’s legacy would fade if he continued to captain without interruption. Imran did not officially retire after the 1992 World Cup. He had injured his shoulder during the World Cup, and it was fairly clear at that time that his career was at its end. Just before I left for the Test series in England, Pakistan Cricket Board Secretary Shahid Rafi assured me that I would remain Pakistan’s captain for as long as I played. There was no prospect of Imran returning to lead.

When I went to England with the team in the early summer of 1992, Imran was very active there. He was writing columns and articles in English newspapers. In some of his articles, he was also trying to expose our weaknesses and tactics. In one column, he wrote that Pakistani batting would be most exposed on wickets that were conducive to seam bowlers. It was not that he was revealing state secrets to the enemy. But a captain, you would never expect anything like that from a captain.

On that tour, Imran was in touch with several members of the team, especially the juniors. He even organised a party where he invited the entire team except Ramiz Raja, Salim Malik and me. I found it strange. This man was leading from a high position a few months ago, not even spending time talking to the youngsters in the team. Now he is contacting these same junior youngsters and inviting them for dinner. There was something about this.

I guess Imran's efforts were aimed at creating a case against my captaincy. My tour to England in 1992 was great, there was no fear or doubt about the captaincy. At that time, these actions of Imran did not seem that serious. But when my dream of uninterrupted captaincy was shattered after returning from New Zealand, everything made perfect sense.

As I said, one reason for Imran's behavior was the fear that I would tarnish his legacy. I think one reason was his dissatisfaction with the way his own captaincy had ended. We won the 1992 World Cup under him, but he was not universally admired within that team. Imran was an excellent cricket leader, no doubt about that. But his excessiveness in raising funds for cancer hospitals had made the players lose patience. The players had given him a nickname - 'Meter'. It means a money-counting machine that is always ticking. Imran knew very well that no player was sad to see him go.

As I said, I am only guessing at Imran's motives. Although I am sure that he played a significant role in my eventual exit from the captaincy.

It was not long before the Board's real intentions were revealed after I returned from New Zealand in January 1993. Akram was soon announced as the new captain. At that moment, I confronted the Board Chairman, Justice Nasim Hasan Shah, and the Board Secretary, Shahid Rafi. I told them, 'Today you have ruined Pakistan cricket.'

I made my feelings known about the decision to appoint Wasim Akram as captain in my place. It is not that Akram was not a worthy candidate. It is just that he was not fit for the captaincy at that moment. I felt strongly that for the sake of the stability of the team, I should have continued as captain.

After my removal, the foundation we had worked so hard to build in terms of stability and reliability was destroyed and the team was in a state of disarray. The decision-makers in Pakistan cricket had misread the situation severely, and our cricket has paid a heavy price for this.

From the 1992-93 West Indies tour of Musus to the end of the decade, captaincy had no meaning in Pakistan. Captaincy had become a game of musical chairs. During this time, the leadership changed fourteen times among seven people. There was Akram, then Salim Malik, Ramiz Raja, Akram again, Saeed Anwar, Ramiz again, then Akram again...and so on. In this circus, Rashid Latif and Amir Sohail were also tried as captains. Naturally, this harmed Pakistan cricket.

Note for the reader:

Javed Miandad blamed Imran Khan for removing him from the captaincy, but Imran did not make any public comments on the matter. However, Wasim Akram, who became the Pakistan captain after Miandad, claimed that Imran had no hand in it. At that time, Imran was busy with the cancer hospital project. And Miandad's 'player management' was also not good.

However, another Pakistani cricketer of that time, Salim Malik, said in an interview in 2022 that it was a mistake to remove Javed Miandad from the captaincy. It is worth mentioning that Javed Miandad became the captain for the first time in 1979-80. Although it was on an interim basis. Thus, Miandad captained for a total of 11 series or matches before the 1992 World Cup. In this article, that is what Miandad meant when he talked about building his and Imran's team in the decade before the 1990s.