Why Hafeez was not offered a central contract by PCB?

Veteran all-rounder Mohammad Hafeez was not offered a central contract by the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) for the 2021-22 season.

According to sources, the relationship between top PCB officials and Hafeez isn’t ideal at the moment.

Few months back, in February, PCB had offered Hafeez a Category C contract, after his record-breaking performance in T20 cricket in 2020, but that was rejected by the latter. The all-rounder had scored the highest number of runs, 415, in 10 matches at an average of 83.

Some PCB officials were not impressed with Hafeez rejecting their offer, which is he was not contacted before the annual central contract list was announced yesterday.  

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In an interview, former batting coach Younis Khan had also said that one PCB official told him to “join the bio-bubble at the specified time for England tour or else you know how we treated Hafeez”, which indicates strained relationship between the two parties.

Meanwhile, sources close to Hafeez have revealed that he has no plans about retirement at the moment and is focused on playing the T20 World Cup later this year. They added that if Hafeez was offered a better contract, he would have accepted it.

On the other hand, PCB, according to sources, is of the opinion that Hafeez’s current form and the fact that he is about to turn 41 didn’t merit a central contract.

It must be noted that Hafeez has only scored 65 runs, at an average of 13, in T20 cricket this year. He was also unable to produce the goods in the recently concluded HBL PSL 6.