Can Pakistan hit a home run this time?

Kolkata: With all the doubts surrounding India's partaking in the tournament, the Champions Trophy hosts Pakistan must be feeling a sense of deja vu akin to the 1996 World Cup. Pakistan hosted a semi-final and final in that tournament, attracting sold-out crowds match after match, all in the hopes of recreating the euphoria seen at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in 1992 at Lahore's Gaddafi Stadium.

Pakistan in 1996 weren’t too different from the victorious side of four years earlier. No such anticipation may exist now as the Champions Trophy is brought out after almost eight years, probably for one last hurrah.

The long gap means Pakistan don’t quite give the feel of defending champions. There are only Fakhar Zaman and Babar Azam to relate to but none of the pacers or even the spinners, making the 2017 Champions Trophy win seem so distant. Factor in Pakistan’s incredibly high player turnover and suddenly it feels like a different lifetime. Not to forget how Pakistan’s stagnation in the meantime has been accentuated by other nations’ progress.

Australia keep adding trophies to their cabinet. India made the semi-finals of the 2019 ODI World Cup and the 2023 final, and won the 2024 T20 World Cup. England won consecutive World Cups, ODI and T20, New Zealand won the World Test Championship, and South Africa finally reached the final of a World Cup last year. All this while, Pakistan had nothing to write home about.

There’s no denying that the international isolation since the terror attack on the Sri Lanka team bus in Lahore 16 years ago dealt a body blow to Pakistan cricket. But in trying to thrive as a Test power in the adopted grounds of the UAE or by striving to reach the knockouts of ICC events, Pakistan showed the will to stay relevant. For that endeavour to collapse altogether post the 2017 Champions Trophy was unlike them.

For the record, Pakistan wasn’t witnessing anything they hadn’t seen before. Captains being appointed and dumped without notice, too many confusing press statements, reports of a divided dressing room are all staple Pakistan cricket news. What continued to confound the world in those years is how Pakistan kept finding ways to win despite these overwhelming odds. And that is exactly what they must do once again as cricket in its resplendent version finally returns to Pakistan.

There must be pressure but Pakistan captain Mohammad Rizwan won’t go there. “I think, most importantly, we should all enjoy the Champions Trophy as it is after a long time (that) we are having such a big event in Pakistan, after 10 years we spent playing our home matches elsewhere,” he said on Tuesday. “If you see, even in those 10 years (2009-2018) we suffered, Pakistan cricket did well and won big matches, including being the Test No.1 team and (winning the) Champions Trophy. I hope we can repeat that same thing in this tournament,” the wicketkeeper said.

Pakistan may have deserved better but they have not necessarily played or prepared for it. Dropping Babar Azam and then trying to reintegrate him in the core hasn’t yielded results. Shaheen Shah Afridi hasn’t been handled well in patches. The selection methodology has become more interesting in recent times with Pakistan’s no-holds barred batting approach helping them chase down their highest ever ODI total. Despite Azam’s allure and Zaman’s experience, Rizwan is central to this attempted revamp, not just as a batter but also as Pakistan’s tactical brain who is acutely aware of their limitations.

Unpredictable they may still be, but this is Pakistan’s chance to write a perfect script, which they failed to in 1996.

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