Australia great Ricky Ponting believes an inexperienced Pakistani batter Saim Ayub can make an impact during the T20 World Cup and said the young player at the top of Men in Green's batting order might cause a surprise.
While captain Babar Azam and trusted opener Mohammad Rizwan will be key to Pakistan's success in the T20 World Cup, Ponting believes a young batter at the top of their batting order could surprise.
Ayub opened the batting with Rizwan in Pakistan's recent T20I series against Ireland, and Ponting believes the hard-hitting left-hander is worth keeping an eye on during the T20 World Cup.
"I loved the look of Ayub out here during the Australian summer. He played that Test match in Sydney, I reckon it was and I didn't know much about him then," Ponting told The ICC Review.
"When I'm sitting there commentating, I like to know about players and what they can do, so I actually went back and had a look at some of his PSL stuff. And he's a proper player. I think he's a real star in the making," he added.
Ponting said Pakistan looks a lot more established with Babar Azam leading the team.
Babar was reappointed as Pakistan's white-ball captain earlier this year, following a brief stint when renowned pacer Shaheen Afridi led the team in the shortest version of the game.
And Ponting thinks Pakistan's chances of going one better than their runner-up finish at the most recent edition of the T20 World Cup in Australia in 2022 and matching their sole title success from 2009, appear much brighter with Babar in charge.
"Captaincy just sits well with some people and it doesn't sit well with others. We've seen it through the years that some of the best players that have ever played the game have not necessarily made the best captains and the thing that makes some of the very best players so good is how focused they are on what they need to do to get better and to be the best and find a way every day to get better," Ponting said.
"And when you are captain, you can't do that. You've got to actually compartmentalise what you're doing, look after your own game, look after all the guys around you. So some guys can manage that better than others," he added.
Ponting believes that Babar has learned from his downfall.
"I reckon Babar when he first started, I had that feeling that he... because if you look at his record, his numbers went down on the back of it. So I think he might have learned a bit from that. Shaheen didn't set the world on fire as a leader either, so I think going back into a World Cup it just looks like a more settled team when you've got someone like Babar as captain rather than Afridi," he added.
