Tough love, a strong identity and an authentically Pakistani way to play – these are the things on the agenda for Pakistan’s new red-ball coach
Danyal Rasool25-Jul-2024″In Pakistan cricket,” Jason Gillespie, the side’s new Test coach, begins, weighing his words carefully even though what he’s about to say is undeniable, “I know there’s been a lot of change in all facets. Gary [Kirsten, Pakistan’s new white-ball coach] and I both get that. We’ve had some really good conversations and good discussions with the PCB about how we can put structures and systems in place so that while we’re moving in the right direction short term, in the medium and long term, Pakistan cricket is going to be healthier.”Gillespie could scarcely have described the last few years in Pakistan cricket more pithily. Since December 2022, the PCB has had five chairmen. In that period, Saqlain Mushtaq, Grant Bradburn, Mickey Arthur, Mohammad Hafeez and Azhar Mahmood all served as either team director or head coach. Batting and bowling coaches came and went, and half a dozen chief selectors picked at least one squad each.The results in Test cricket have taken the sharpest nose dive; since the start of 2022, Pakistan have won just three and lost eight of 15, with all three wins coming against Sri Lanka. They have not won a home Test in more than three years.Related
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“You want to get systems in place,” Gillespie says. “To get the right players, you need the right people around the organisation, and you need the pathway. That’s when you’re moving forward. It’s very easy when you’re coming into jobs; you’ve got a two-year contract or a one-year contract. You make short-term decisions to look after your own back. But that doesn’t help anyone, because if everyone has that approach, nothing long-term gets done.”Pakistan fans might be excused for sighing wearily at this point. That is no fault of Gillespie’s, of course, but various chairmen and coaches have attempted, with varying degrees of success, to make positive changes to the national team and its infrastructure. Under Ehsan Mani, Pakistan adopted a domestic first-class structure that did away with bloated departmental teams; those sides are now back and Mani is long gone. During Mickey Arthur’s first stint as head coach, he and Steve Rixon successfully transformed Pakistan’s fielding and fitness standards, but the days of Pakistan having suddenly emerged as an elite fielding unit now almost seem illusory.
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Gillespie is on his way to the National Stadium, in a bulletproof van flanked by an armed police escort, charging through Karachi’s bustling evening traffic. Pakistan Shaheens are to be put through their paces for four days at a training camp in preparation for their (currently ongoing) tour of Darwin, Australia, where they play a pair of practice games against a Bangladesh A side ahead of the Bangladesh senior squad’s visit to Pakistan for two Test matches in August.Gillespie sat contemplatively in the back of the vehicle. He may not have been surprised at the security; he’d been told by fellow Australians who previously worked in Pakistan cricket that he’d be extremely well looked after.His job here is rather different from the ones he quit a year early to accept: a nine-year stint with Adelaide Strikers in the BBL, and four years with the state team, South Australia. That state’s population is over ten times smaller than the city whose roads he now speeds along, the scale and nature of media attention in a single-sport country like Pakistan rendering the two roles barely comparable.6:12
‘I’d ask the players how they want to be seen in the cricket world’
“It was a pretty simple decision in the end,” Gillespie says. We meet at the Marriott, where he is staying. He only got back to Karachi from Lahore in the small hours of the morning, after an unscheduled emergency meeting with PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi necessitated a last-minute hop over to Lahore. Having taken the flight over from Lahore myself the previous day, I note we could have met in Lahore after all. He appreciates making the effort to conduct the interview in person. “It’s so much better than Zoom,” he says.His family was excited when he was offered the role – his kids were “just in wonder”, he says. His 18-year-old son Jackson, a 6’6″ fast bowler for the South Australia Under-19 side and a “mad cricketer”, thought it was brilliant. There was a more measured conversation with his wife and the rest of his family, who are back in Australia. Though Gillespie won’t be in Pakistan full time, the busy upcoming schedule means he will be away from home for long stretches. But his heart was set on this assignment.”Pakistan is an exciting cricket team and has a passionate fan base,” he says. “And this is an opportunity to be involved in international cricket and work with the best players. Having not been on the international circuit for a while since I finished playing, it’s going to be a new experience and a new challenge, which I’m really excited about.”It wasn’t as straightforward a decision for Pakistan, though. Having agonised and deliberated over coaching appointments, they sounded out Shane Watson and Daren Sammy, among others, before finally agreeing terms with Gillespie and Kirsten. This is the first time Pakistan have trialled split-format coaching.Gillespie has never coached an international side full-time before. He’s from the right country, of course – Pakistan’s predilection for Australians in leadership positions is legendary by now. And he has only ever spent extended periods of time with a side – he has never served as a full-time coach of a team for fewer than two seasons; that appears to have shaped his views on how coaching success is defined.According to Gillespie, while infrastructure and coaching diktats are reversible, identity cannot so easily be dispensed with. He suggests England’s mentality shift in white-ball cricket in 2015, and eventually Test cricket with the arrival of Brendon McCullum, are not as dependent on individual talents, and therefore stand a chance of surviving long after their original architects have moved on. While he might in part have the job because Pakistan long for that fabled Australian winning mentality, he wants to find out how to play a style of cricket that is “authentic to Pakistan”.”I’m happy to admit I don’t have the answer to what that is,” he says. “I just got here. I want to engage the players and the coaches around and get as much information as I can. We see other countries around the world and it’s very clear how they want to go about their play. Whether they’re successful or not, at least you know their identity exists.”If being honest is telling a player something they might not want to hear, well, then I’m willing to do that”•AFP via Getty Images”So that’s what I want us to ask – how do you want to play and how does it fit in with our squad and our team – and go from there. Then, if you have buy-in from all the players and if players and coaches and the PCB are on the same page and moving together as one, surely that will give us more chance of having progression and success.”I want both the Pakistan public and the media to be able to watch us play and go, ‘Yes, this is the style of cricket Pakistan are playing.'”The simple example is England. No one’s left in any doubt how England will play. Everyone’s pretty clear how Australia go about their work. That’s all I’m looking for from our team. I think it’s really important that, as a coach, I don’t just come in and say, ‘This is how we are going to play.’ It’s got to come from the players. My role is to support that and how I can help us go about that in the best and most effective way.”Famously his own man in what was viewed as a fiercely tribal Australian team, Gillespie makes no secret of his wish to prioritise identity and style over context-free win-loss records as a catch-all measure for success.He cultivates a wide range of interests that extend beyond the game of cricket, and – as a practising vegan – could just as easily have a nuanced discussion on the ethics of industrial meat and dairy consumption as on the intricacies of what makes a Dukes cricket ball move sideways. It’s a outlook that has marked the course of his coaching career.Gillespie’s stint with Yorkshire remains his biggest success, when he took over a second-division side and coached them to two successive first-division titles, in 2014 and 2015. He was, at the time, a leading candidate for the England head coach job. But even in times of relative famine, like in his recent stint with South Australia – he termed it his “dream job” – where the side finished in the bottom half during each of his four seasons in charge, he feels comfortable he left the team “in a much better place” than he found it.Gillespie coached Yorkshire to two successive County Championship trophies, and was instrumental in their promotion to Division One•Sarah Ansell/Getty ImagesHe takes particular pride in having helped groom elite players for the Australian national side – Travis Head, Alex Carey and Jake Fraser-McGurk were all nurtured at South Australia and have seen their international fortunes soar over the past four years.”We played some really good cricket [at South Australia],” Gillespie says. “Last year we played ten first-class games and had nine results. More results didn’t go our way [three wins, six losses], but if you actually looked at the games, there were some very close contests. There were games within a couple of wickets or a couple of runs. The numbers could have been the exact opposite; it was just those key moments in games. The positives were that we were playing result [oriented] cricket.”While there was disappointment in one sense, there was a lot of pride because we got opportunities at the highest level for some players. I’m not sure you can judge a domestic coach on just the win-losses.”Gillespie feels confident the PCB chairman and the board share his and Kirsten’s vision for the team, and there are already signs of a shift in tone and substance. When told Shaheen Shah Afridi was slated to play the Global T20 in Canada just days before the two-Test match series in Bangladesh started, his response was suggestive: “Is he? Are you sure about that?”A few days later it was announced the PCB had decided against issuing NOCs to Naseem Shah for the Hundred, and to Shaheen, Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan for the GT20. It is a process he admits needs careful navigation, but Gillespie is crystal clear on the primacy of the international side.”Players are centrally contracted and getting compensated really well. We have the right to be able to say, ‘Look, in this situation, we need you to rest or have some downtime to give your body and mind a break, be ready for the next challenge for Pakistan.’In his time with South Australia, Gillespie oversaw the development of future Australia stalwarts like Travis Head•Cricket Australia/Getty Images”We want players to go and play in these leagues and have these great experiences. But if we believe it’s going to be to the detriment of representing Pakistan in an upcoming series, then we’ll have a discussion and have a decision to make.”These are honest and difficult conversations. Ultimately, we’re tasked with doing what’s right by Pakistan cricket.”In times such as these, when the bond between the national team and its supporters appears to be fraying, the idea that the team needs a hard-nosed strongman to control the players with an iron fist often gains traction in Pakistan. And while Arthur, Pakistan’s longest-serving overseas head coach over the past decade, managed to form a particularly close bond with the core of the side, he also possessed a schoolmasterly streak he could always draw on. It played well in front of the television cameras, which appeared to take an almost prurient interest in his emotions when Pakistan were struggling.Gillespie, though, is far removed from that style of coaching, emphasising the need to build relationships that enable tough, honest conversations. “If being honest is telling a player something they might not want to hear, well, then I’m willing to do that. I want to help them be the best player and person they can be.”Gillespie recalls the days he played against Pakistan, and the sense of joy and fun he felt Pakistan took in their cricket. “I remember this training kit the Pakistan boys had. They had all the logos on, and on the back, it said ‘Proud to be Pakistani’. Do you remember those shirts? That stuck in my head. That was 20 years ago! And for me, that really resonated. I thought, ‘That’s cool.'”That pride is how I felt representing my country, putting on that cap and wearing the shirt with the Australian coat of arms. It meant the world to me. Playing for your country is the best thing in the world – it’s awesome.”It’s an honour and a privilege for me to coach Pakistan, and it’s an honour and a privilege for each and every player to represent Pakistan. That for me, is something that’s always stood out. I know when I played against Pakistan, that came through.”