Daily Times

For the first time in public, it has been revealed that senior players staged a coup against then-captain Younus Khan during the ICC Champions Trophy 2009. Former captain and flamboyant all-rounder Shahid Afridi, in his book ‘GAME CHANGER’, said that a senior batsman was majorly responsible for the breakdown of stability and goodwill within the team. Afridi refrained from naming the player. His hints, however, were very clear. “I won’t name him, but one of the seniors in the team at the time, a great batsman in his own right, was majorly responsible for the breakdown of stability and goodwill within the team. It saddens me because he was one of the finest batsmen of those years,” Afridi wrote in the chapter ‘Strain of Command’. The former captain further wrote that during the ICC Champions Trophy in South Africa, the batsman essentially attempted a coup.

“He called a team meeting of all the major players sans the captain Younus Khan and announced that he was not satisfied and motivated under Younus Khan’s captaincy. That was that-he had declared an all-out rebellion, bang in the middle of a major tournament,” Afridi wrote. Afridi added that when he was told about the plan of informing then-chairperson Ejaz Butt that no one wants to play under Younus, he tried to convince him otherwise. “I said that it was unfair of him to lobby other players into feeling as dissatisfied as him, specially the younger players. I advised him to take the matter directly to Younus Khan and tell him, man to man. The dissident refused,” Afridi said.

The all-rounder further adds that Shoaib Malik, Naved ul Hasan, and Saeed Ajmal had also supported the plan. Afridi also said that he requested then-manager Yawar Saeed to set up a meeting with Ejaz Butt and, when the meeting happened, all the players opened up about what their problems were with Younus. “I said that the issues outlined could be sorted out and there was nothing that a team couldn’t resolve. Following the meeting, I told Ejaz Butt privately that Younis is a great captain and should be allowed to retain captaincy and the problems the boys had should be taken to him in a transparent fashion to avoid a similar situation in future,” Afridi claimed. Younus was later removed from captaincy. “Eventually the dissident batsman was made captain for an overseas tour. When Pakistan didn’t win a single game on the tour, the same things – conspiracy and controversy – hit him too,” Afridi wrote. “The moral of the story is simple: if you dig a hole for others, make sure you don’t fall into it yourself,” the former captain advised.