Misbah-ul-Haq congratulates Shoaib Malik on a wonderful ODI career

Shoaib Malik might have had a poor farewell at ICC World Cup 2019 as he could manage just eight runs and a wicket in the tournament before getting dropped. But when the 37-year-0ld called it a day following his team’s completion of the journey in the tournament which they did in style by thumping Bangladesh by 94 runs in the final game at Lord’s, a lot of faces looked disappointed.

Malik is one of the last few cricketers who had made their debut in the 1990s and with his call for retirement, truly glorious career in the ODIs came to an end. Malik will still play in the T20I format in which Pakistan are the No.1 side.

Malik captained Pakistan in 41 ODIs, winning 25

In 20 years, Shoaib Malik played in 35 Tests, 287 ODIs and 111 T20Is for Pakistan and scored 2,712, 7,958 and 540 runs, respectively, across the formats. He scored 12 hundreds in all and also picked 218 wickets in all formats together. Besides, in 345 T20s, Malik made 8,701 runs and took 136 wickets.

He also captained Pakistan in three Tests in 2007 though couldn’t win besides in 41 ODIs, leading his side to 25 wins and 16 losses. He also led his country in 20 T20Is, winning 13, losing six and tying one. Four of his nine ODI hundreds came against arch-rivals India even though he was blasted brutally following his golden duck against the same opponents in this World Cup.

Former Pakistan captain Misbah-ul-Haq, who had played alongside Shoaib Malik on several occasions, congratulated the latter on his retirement and recalled the good memories that he had shared with him. The 45-year-old also acknowledged that his cricketing career had seen a rebirth under Malik’s captaincy.

Shoaib Malik could have seen an extension of his career by another few games had Pakistan qualified for the semi-finals in this edition. However, their beginning in the competition was so poor that they could not make up for the bad net run-rate even after winning their last four games against South Africa, New Zealand, Afghanistan and Bangladesh. They needed to beat Bangladesh by 316 runs or more in their final game but that was too unrealistic a call for them to pip New Zealand to make the last four.