ESPNcricinfo calls it Pakistan cricket’s worst administrative era — and not a single Pakistani journalist had the courage to write what a foreign outlet finally said

ESPNcricinfo has published a damning analysis calling the current PCB under Mohsin Naqvi the worst administrative era in Pakistan cricket history citing player abandonment toxic system and governance failures.

By ESPN-Cricinfo | Sports & Accountability Desk | MediaBites.com.pk

It took a foreign cricket publication to say what Pakistan’s entire sports journalism community has been tiptoeing around for months.

ESPNcricinfo, the world’s most authoritative cricket publication, has published a comprehensive analysis describing the current administrative period of the Pakistan Cricket Board as the worst in Pakistan cricket’s history.

Not the worst this decade. Not the worst in recent memory. The worst. Ever.

And the question that every Pakistani cricket fan and every honest media professional must sit with is an uncomfortable one. Why did it take Cricinfo to write this? Where was Pakistan’s own sports press?

What Cricinfo Actually Said

The analysis centres on a moment that captures the PCB’s dysfunction more vividly than any scoreline can.

Mohammad Ali, Pakistan’s fast bowler, fronted the post-match press conference on the third evening of the Birmingham Test without a PCB media manager present. Alone. Facing an international press corps. With no institutional support.

Cricinfo called this “unthinkable for almost any board in this day and age.”

It is not a small detail. A media manager’s presence at post-match press conferences is the most basic function of any professional cricket board’s communications operation. It is not optional. It is not a luxury. It is the floor-level requirement of professional cricket administration in 2026.

PCB could not manage the floor.

The Numbers That Condemn

The analysis places the current administrative failure in stark statistical context.

Pakistan’s recent batting totals in England: 171, 135, 110 and 194.

Results: An innings and 103-run defeat. A 194-run loss. 10 defeats in the last 11 away Tests.

Pakistan currently sits at the bottom of the World Test Championship table.

These are not the numbers of a team going through a difficult period. These are the numbers of a team that has been systematically failed by the institution responsible for its development, selection, preparation, and support.

The Five-Year Pattern — And Where It Started

Cricinfo’s analysis does not pin the crisis on Mohsin Naqvi alone, though his tenure features prominently. It traces the roots of the current dysfunction back five years, to the period following Ehsan Mani’s departure as PCB chairman — the last time, the analysis argues, the board had something resembling functional cricket administration.

Since then the pattern has been consistent and damaging:

A shift toward dead pitches after a period of well-prepared surfaces that were producing competitive cricket. The removal of an executive layer that concentrated all power with the chairman. A public standoff in which a chairman blamed the captain and team for a World Cup loss and leaked private messages to a television channel.

The “governmentalisation” of the board — bureaucratic appointees with limited cricketing knowledge now central to decision-making — is identified as one of the most dangerous trends. Cricinfo warned this sets a precedent for future governments to use the PCB for their own political purposes rather than cricket’s development.

Mohammad Abbas — Nine Wickets and a Reprimand

The analysis highlights another moment that reveals the PCB’s dysfunction in personal and human terms.

Mohammad Abbas took nine wickets at Lord’s. He earned a place on the Lord’s honors board, one of cricket’s most prestigious individual recognitions. He then faced reporters alone and answered honestly — including questions about why the board sent him instead of captain Babar Azam and about the team’s professionalism.

For his honesty, the PCB media manager reprimanded Abbas within earshot of journalists.

A player who delivered one of Pakistan cricket’s most distinguished individual performances in years was publicly humiliated by his own board’s communications staff for answering questions truthfully.

Domestic Cricket — Broken Promises and Abandoned Tournaments

The PCB’s failure extends beyond the Test team. The analysis documents a domestic cricket environment in crisis.

Tournaments launched at significant expense and then quietly abandoned. Schedules changed at the last minute without explanation. Promised increases in domestic player pay were never delivered.

The Under-19 red-ball and white-ball tournaments were postponed after a single day of play and never rescheduled. Young Pakistani cricketers, the next generation the system is supposed to be developing, were simply left without cricket.

Low domestic wages are pushing players toward the tape-ball circuit as a more financially reliable alternative to the formal cricket structure. Pakistan is losing its own players to tape-ball because the PCB cannot pay them enough to justify playing the real game.

The Untouchables Question

Cricinfo’s conclusion is unambiguous. The players — Mohammad Ali, Ali Usman, Azan Awais, Abdullah Shafique, Saud Shakeel, and Mohammad Abbas — do not deserve the blame for what is happening to Pakistan cricket.

They are, in Cricinfo’s words, “a product of a decrepit and toxic system.” It is the players and Pakistan’s fans who suffer most from it.

This is the verdict of the world’s most respected cricket publication after observing Pakistan cricket’s administrative dysfunction from the outside.

Now here is the question that Pakistan’s sporting media must answer honestly.

Cricinfo’s reporters, based in England, watched Pakistan cricket and wrote this analysis. Pakistan’s sports journalists watch it from within the country, attend press conferences, cover the matches, observe the dysfunction up close, and talk to the players and coaches regularly.

They saw everything Cricinfo saw. They saw more.

Why did it take a foreign publication to say it?

The answer to that question is a separate story about press freedom, institutional pressure, advertiser relationships, and the complicated ecosystem in which Pakistani sports journalism operates. It is a story worth telling.

But today the more urgent story is the one Cricinfo told. Pakistan cricket is being run into the ground by people who do not understand it, do not respect it, and are not accountable for what they are doing to it.

Chairman Mohsin Naqvi, this verdict is on the record. It is in writing. It is from the world’s most credible cricket publication.

What is your response?