Pakistan are set to host Bangladesh in a two-match Test series starting August 21. The home side have been under mass criticism since the debacle in the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2024. Pakistan were knocked out from the group stage of the tournament after suffering embarrassing losses to host USA and arch-rivals India in the opening two games. 

Previous to the T20 World Cup, Pakistan had been knocked out from the group stages of the ICC ODI World Cup 2023 which was held in India. Babar Azam had to face a lot of heat in the last few months since he was the skipper of the side in both tournaments. 

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One of the aspects of Babar’s game that was heavily criticized was his fitness level. Fans and pundits mocked the batter for his fitness levels, stating that his underwhelming physicality was the reason behind his below-par performances. 

However, Former Pakistan captain, Salman Butt has come to the 29-year-old’s aid ahead of the series against Bangladesh, stating that the batter has scored enough runs in the past few years, loving his fitness. 

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Salman praised Babar’s ability to score runs, stating that the player has scored a ‘truckload’ of runs in the past two years and has proved himself in terms of fitness by running on the field and batting well in both the first as well as the second innings of the game. 

Babar Azam scored truckloads of runs in the last 2 years, he proved his fitness, he ran on the field, and scored runs while batting first as well as second innings. Things should go up but they are getting broken in the middle, which is wrong. So, this is the responsibility of the players to maintain their fitness

It’s not just Babar who has been criticized for his fitness but the entire Pakistan cricket team. The team was the centre of attention for all the wrong reasons since their T20 World Cup debacle. Talking about the same on his YouTube channel, Salman questioned the physios and trainers for such physical condition of the players. 

All Pakistan is talking about the fitness of the team and it brought a storm in Pakistan, players at the junior level were asked to run. This came after people said players weren't fit in the T20 World Cup 2024. No one questioned the physios or trainers, but instead, they started making players at the district level push hard for fitness. Those who made errors are still there

All the attention will now be on the upcoming series against Bangladesh with Shan Masood leading the side. 

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Shan Masood (captain), Saud Shakeel, Aamir Jamal (subject to fitness), Abdullah Shafique, Abrar Ahmed, Babar Azam, Kamran Ghulam, Khurram Shahzad, Mir Hamza, Mohammad Ali, Muhammad Hurraira, Mohammad Rizwan, Naseem Shah, Saim Ayub, Salman Ali Agha, Sarfaraz Ahmed, and Shaheen Shah Afridi.

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Rahul is a content producer for The Sporting News’ India edition.