Not long after the 2019 ODI World Cup, the then Pakistan skipper Sarfaraz Ahmed found himself being forced out of the Pakistan team. It’s been almost a year since Sarfaraz played for the Pakistan national team. And now, a bold claim has been made by a former Pakistan bowler over the veteran wicket-keeper batter’s future.

Claiming to be aware of the ‘inside talks’ in the Pakistan team, Sikander Bakht suggested that Pakistan’s current wicket-keeper batter Mohammad Rizwan has said that he would never let Sarfaraz make a comeback into the national team.

“Sarfaraz will not play now. Our cricket community is quite small, so we get to know a lot of things. A cricketer who does programmes with us told us that Rizwan said, “main Sarfaraz ko kabhi aane nahi dunga (I won’t let Sarfaraz return to Pakistan team). That’s because when Sarfaraz was there, he didn’t let Rizwan play. So now it’s the opposite. This is what I have heard. I might be wrong,” Bakht said in a chat on Pakistani TV channel Geo Super.

Rizwan first made his debut for Pakistan in April 2015 against Bangladesh. It was after the 2019 ODI World Cup that he started to cement his place in the team.

Recently, even Rizwan has been subjected to criticism over his poor strike-rate in T20Is. In the recently-concluded Asia Cup 2022, Rizwan was Pakistan’s top-scoring batter but his runs came at a low strike-rate of 117.57. Yet, there’s no denying that Rizwan is presently quite ahead in the pecking order in comparison to Sarfaraz.