Former Pakistan cricketers Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Hafeez would compare Indian all-rounder Hardik Pandya to another ex-Pakistan player Abdul Razzaq and both would agree that Razzaq was a better player than Hardik. However, Hafeez would also concede that Pakistan cricket should have taken more care of Razzaq and also the player himself should have responded more.
“I would agree with him. You take out the details of Abdul Razzaq’s performances. He was a better and bigger performer. But the system didn’t look after him and the player also didn’t respond that much. He was limited in his skills and didn’t try to outdo his own potential. Whatever I’ve seen of Razzaq, he was better than this version of Hardik,” Hafeez said speaking on ‘Game on Hai.’
Speaking of how versatile Razzaq was Akhtar would say, “He was asked to open, played in the middle order and sometimes even lower order. He has done everything but he didn’t get the respect until he won a match against South Africa single-handedly. I was at the other end. I defended a full toss and he said ‘don’t lift your bat’. I said I won’t. He was hitting the ball so hard that day that I thought if the ball came towards me, it would go through me. But we didn’t give him the respect, and neither did we give Azhar Mahmood the respect that he deserved. He was a great performer with the ball,”
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