I met up with former Pakistan coach Geoff Lawson in the rather plush surroundings of the broadcasting centre at the Oval yesterday whilst the South Africa versus West Indies match was in progress and shortly before the crucial encounter between Pakistan and New Zealand.

Geoff is over in the UK commentating for the BBC on the Twenty/20 World Cup and the interview was conducted during a break in his commentary stint.
 

PakPassion.Net Im here with Geoff Lawson, former Pakistan coach. He is over in England doing some commentary work for the BBC for the T20 World Cup tournament that is ongoing. Just like to convey my thanks to you Geoff for taking some time out of your busy schedule and doing this interview for PakPassion.net

PakPassion.Net Having fun over here commentating?

Geoff Lawson Oh yeah, it’s good fun, it’s a good tournament, so far the weather hasn’t been too bad, we had a few games earlier rained out but I always enjoy working with the BBC and it’s given me an opportunity to catch up with a few of the old guys I used to coach.


PakPassion.Net Geoff, obviously with us being a Pakistani cricket website most of my questions will focus on your stint as Pakistan coach and the current team of course. Sum up in your own words your stint as Pakistan coach.

Geoff Lawson Well firstly I had a wonderful time, I was living in Lahore and I quite enjoyed my time there. I found the people in general to be very friendly and hospitable, that always makes your time living in a foreign country a lot easier. I was there with my fitness trainer David Dwyer, who still works with the Pakistan team, so we were a couple of gorahs (white people) in a foreign country and we enjoyed ourselves a great deal, I look on my stint as a wonderful time and particular my time in Lahore, very enjoyable, it was just frustrating that I wasn’t allowed to continue in the job so I could finish my 2 years and really work on coaching because I would still love to be doing the job with the boys because they are a great bunch.


PakPassion.Net Geoff, it sounds to me as if you feel its unfinished business. If you were offered the role again, I mean Intikhab Alam is doing the job at the moment, if the job did come up again would you be interested in taking the role on?

Geoff Lawson Look I have been asked several times where I would like to coach again, my name was linked with the England job and a couple of other jobs that’s been going around, the New Zealand job as well. I have always said if I had the choice my first priority would be to go back and finish the job in Pakistan, I was quite enjoying it, I thought we were actually improving as a team. We had lots of things to do, lots of hard work to be done, get rid of some old habits and get some new habits but I thought we were going quite well. We had quite a good record and we had a very young team and it was a very good group to work with, and when you get to work with young guys who simply want to become better and better at what they do it makes your job a lot easier, so yeah I would certainly contemplate if I was offered and I would certainly contemplate going back and finishing the job I started. 


PakPassion.Net Geoff, What were the best aspects of the job and the most frustrating aspects of being coach of the Pakistan team?

Geoff Lawson Well, the best aspects was dealing with young and enthusiastic men and some great talent, so that was certainly the best part of it and getting to go around Pakistan to look at the other cricket talent, I mean Pakistan is so full of great talent, it’s a pity the system doesn’t really get the best out of people, whereas you got the Australians and South Africans, the system they have ensures that the best players get the best opportunities to become the best they can which is why they are the top couple of countries in the world, and, that doesn’t quite happen in Pakistan. I think going to the Nasim Ashraf regime so to speak, I think he was heading in the right direction you know, lots of development going on, regional academies, lots of funding of first class cricket teams and facilities, It was all heading in the right direction so that was the great bit about it. 

The frustrating (aspect).., there wasn’t too many frustrating things, I mean dealing with a couple of selectors who simply did not have much of an idea what was going on, there was one good selector but two guys who simply weren’t up to the job, that was a little bit frustrating and obviously foreign teams aren’t coming to play in Pakistan, which is out of control of the cricket organisation, it’s not up to them but they are the two major frustrating things amongst a list of very good things.


PakPassion.Net Geoff, you mentioned about the domestic structure not being up to the standard of the Australian structure, are you talking about too many teams or not enough quality teams? 

Geoff Lawson Oh no no, I mean Pakistan’s 175 million people throws twenty. Pakistan should have a lot more teams, it’s just the way that players progress from first class cricket into the national team and just how they are managed and encouraged and all that sort of thing. In Australia all the first class teams, their one aim is to produce Australian players, that’s really their first aim, they play very competitive cricket of course. Pakistan has got a lot of very good competitive teams, it’s not so much that, it’s the fact that talent identification and coaching and a path to the International team is sometimes less than clear


PakPassion.Net Geoff, you mentioned about interference, a couple of selectors not sort of knowing too much about selection yet they were actually selectors. We’ve heard Abdul Qadir recently resigned and he basically said there was too much interference going on from the coach and the manager. Is this an age old problem, did you encounter it a lot? 

Geoff Lawson I think it’s probably an ongoing problem in Pakistan cricket [Laughs]. It’s probably when someone like Imran Khan was captain, he would run the whole organisation and he would make sure he got the best team. I think it’s an ongoing thing. I just thought that it might be a little bit better than it was when I was there but sadly it wasn’t which sort of causes a few problems.


PakPassion.Net Shoaib Akhtar is a name on everyone’s lips at the moment for a number of reasons, how did you find Shoaib when you were coach of Pakistan, both in terms of professionally as a cricketer and off field with regards to his attitude and his methods?

Geoff Lawson As a cricketer I found him totally unprofessional, he would train whenever he would liked to, he didn’t contribute to the team so I couldn’t think of a more unprofessional player which is such a pity because he is such a talented player. When you see players with that natural talent they aren’t really using it, he is using five percent of his talent and being disruptive to the other members of the team. That is a great pity because he has some natural resources in his body, the ability to bowl at 150k an hour that most people don’t and he just wasn’t using it to the best.

A player like that in the Australian system wouldn’t even play club cricket, a club team wouldn’t have him, wouldn’t matter how good he was they would just say we need players who want to commit to the team, want to make a contribution, you have got to be a team player you can’t be an individual. I have said this many times that he wouldn’t have played club cricket in Australia because people would not have him and it’s a great pity because rarely has there been someone of that natural talent running around. 


PakPassion.Net Geoff, moving on to when your tenure ended as coach, there seemed to be a few communication problems with regards to why you was fired, did anybody at the PCB actually sit down and explain to you what the reasons were?

Geoff Lawson No. The government changed, the chairman of the board changed and he made some ridiculous statements. He didn’t even ask me for a report on what we are doing and how we are faring, it was very unprofessional, so I have never been given a reason but that is fine, I understand what the politics are but once again it’s a pity for Pakistan cricket because we had a very good organisation, very good cricket set up, good manager of the team, the set up within the team was conducive to the players doing their best, and that has been totally destroyed. So no reason given but that is life, if people get into positions of power they make decisions not necessarily based on any facts or for the benefit of their team, that is life, got to move on.


PakPassion.Net You talked about you had a very good relationship with majority of the players. How were things with Shoaib Malik who was captain during your reign as coach?

Geoff Lawson Very good, he was a young man trying to learn how to be a captain. You are under a lot of pressure captaining Pakistan at anything and he was the young guy thrown into the position so we worked very closely together to try and help his education, I was a captain for 5 years at New South Wales and very much a senior player, I know the struggles I had when I first became captain. We were all sort of working in the right direction, it wasn’t Malik’s fault that he was given the captaincy but that is just the way things happen in Pakistan. Given that he had the job we were working steadily, in another couple of years I think he would have been a great captain and he may yet be because he is a very thoughtful guy. 

I thought his own personal cricket improved during the time he was captain as well. Things are heading in the right direction and Malik was a nice guy, was always happy to sit down and talk cricket, and to do whatever it took to be a better captain, which was all for the benefit of Pakistan cricket. 


PakPassion.Net On the subject of captaincy, Younis Khan is the captain at the moment, there are various statements coming out at the moment with regards to whether Younis Khan should be in the T20 team never mind captain, what are your views on Younis Khan, the T20 player and the T20 captain?

Geoff Lawson Well I don’t know who is making the statements, I believe Abdul Qadir is probably making the statements, which I don’t agree with. Younis could be the most enthusiastic player in international cricket, he has lots of things going for him, sometimes that enthusiasm bubbles over a little bit and the mad Pathan in him comes out [Laughs]. Basically you can’t fault Younis for the effort and the energy he puts into the game, as a player he is world class and is certainly going to be in the team, whether he should be captain or not in T20 I don’t think it matters a great deal whose the captain but he is a senior player and he has been around the world, he knows what he is doing.


PakPassion.Net Talking of the T20 World Cup and the ongoing tournament, where do you think Pakistan are going wrong? In not so many minutes time they have a crucial encounter against New Zealand, a must win encounter, they have had 4 heavy defeats against top playing nations, how do you see things going today and also where do you think things are going wrong?

Geoff Lawson Well they are making a lot of little mistakes, they nearly won the other night against Sri Lanka, they had a bad start with the bat and the bowl and probably cost them the game by 19 runs. They just have to do everything a little bit better, they are not playing terrible cricket, it’s very unlike 2007 when we really came out and played great cricket in the T20 World Cup from the start. We got some confidence and someone like Sohail Tanvir came in and played, he wasn’t thinking about anything else he just played and bowled beautifully well. If they get him back bowling well and i’m not sure what they are doing to make sure he bowls well but he is a key player to them, to get out there get some wickets early, he just looks like he lacks a bit of confidence at the moment so a good start with the bat and good start with the ball and that’s the difference, Saeed Ajmal is bowling beautifully, Afridi is bowling beautifully, they are doing lots of good things they just need to play a little better in all aspects of the game. 


PakPassion.Net The batting has come in for a lot of criticism, do you think the batting order is flawed or is it just a case of players lacking confidence?

Geoff Lawson Once again I don’t know who the criticism is coming from, Salman Butt is a world class player, with Kamran Akmal opening that is a good thing, the order is almost just about right, I would make sure Misbah Ul Haq faced more balls, so if they lost an early wicket Malik can go in but if they didn’t lose a wicket until the 7th or 8th over that’s when I would be sending Misbah in, he is such a thoughtful player at T20, if he faces 50 balls he is going to get you 70 or 80 or maybe more, so just slightly rejig the order a little bit, they haven’t had a great deal of luck either. 

Kamran Akmal is playing well, Butt needs to have a bit of luck but as I say the only one thing I would probably do is make sure, well two things, make sure that Misbah gets to face a few more balls by batting higher and make sure Fawad Alam is batting in front of Shahid Afridi.


PakPassion.Net Speaking of Shahid Afridi, his bowling form is fantastic at the moment but his batting seems to be all at sea, is it a confidence thing or as Mike Atherton said recently is he living off past glories?

Geoff Lawson First of all I think his bowling has gotten better in the last couple of years. He is bowling superbly well, he is fielding very well, I just think his reactions have gone up, he is older and he just can’t hit every bowl for six anymore. It’s something him and I worked on a lot, look you are not making many runs, you can’t hit the first bowl you face for six, you have to have a batting plan, you have got to hit the bowl on the ground, the first bowl the other day he tries hitting Murali for six and you can’t do that, Fawad Alam should have batted first and Afridi should have been in reserve and try hit the faster bowlers. He just needs to think through what he is doing when he is batting but he is not the player he was 5, 10 years ago, he is a long way from that but he can still be successful if he works on a plan, and certainly I gave him another batting plan to use, he just seems to have forgot it pretty quickly though.


PakPassion.Net When you discussed the batting plan with him, did he actually listen to the advice? Because we have spoken to a number of former players, coaches who have basically said Afridi does his own thing. Was he actually digesting the information you was giving him or was it just a case of through one ear and out the other?

Geoff Lawson Well we talked about it, we did some work in the nets, this is the shot best to play and he certainly seemed to be listening and taking it on board but it is a different thing when you walk out the gate, it doesn’t matter how much you practice when you walk out the gate and take strike, there is different pressures on and that’s perhaps when he’s forgetting, look I’m sure he wants to bat a different way but somehow his instincts take over and those shots just come out. 


PakPassion.Net Coming back to yourself, what do you prefer, coaching or commentary? Quite happy in the commentary box or would you rather be out there with the boys?

Geoff Lawson Sometimes in this tournament I felt like I have been out there, you feel like you are sitting on the bench worrying about every shot and every ball. Coaching is much more stressful, in commentary you can make all the judgements you like and they don’t matter, you are just telling the public what you think so there is no pressure on in the commentary box but sitting on a coaches bench there is a lot of pressure but I like that sort of pressure. 

I think you can help the team out quite a bit if you are down there dealing with all the issues that come along. I quite enjoy coaching, I watched that Australia-Pakistan series in UAE on tv, I’m pretty sure if I had been on the bench in game 3 we would have won, from 0 for 90 we would have gotten 180 but it seemed to me no one was talking to them and making sure everybody knew what they had to do but that’s life and I’m in the commentary box and not the coaches bench.


PakPassion.Net Do the boys still keep in touch with you, you are still quite close to them from what you have been saying, are they still in touch with you or have you actually spoken to any of the guys while you have been over here?

Geoff Lawson I’m in touch with nearly all the guy’s pretty regularly, I went to practice before the first game at Lords and we had a long chat, we exchanged text messages and e-mails, and I actually brought some stuff over from Australia for Kamran Akmal and Salman Butt, they are my friends, apart from any cricket relationship we had they are friends of mine. I appreciate them for all the hospitality they showed me when I was in Pakistan and they will always be my friends, no matter what the cricket situation is. We catch up quite often, we are going to have a dinner with a few guys over the next week or so. As I say we are more than a coach and players, we are good friends.


PakPassion.Net Final question, and once again thanks for your time. Your future plans, I know we touched upon the fact that you are quite happy in the commentary box but you still want to at some point in the future go back to the job of coaching. So what are your future plans, you are back in Australia so any plans to do some coaching over there perhaps?

Geoff Lawson I’m already tied up in coaching over there in the New South Wales system. I actually lecture coaches who are doing coaching courses, I have always done that, forever, cricket’s in my blood I love the game, I am very lucky I get to commentate and coach at different levels. If another International job or maybe a County job came up I would think about it. I do have other options in my life, being an optometrist I’ve got another profession and I’m very fortunate I have got those choices but coaching and being involved in cricket is something I love, and if the right job comes along you never know I might put my hand up for it. 


PakPassion.Net I did say the last question but this is genuinely the last question, will Pakistan win today?

Geoff Lawson I think they will, hopefully they have learnt a few lessons from yesterday, they just need to calm down and take things easy, there are still lots of good things they are doing, just need to eliminate a few little errors and they will be fine. Generally when they are under pressure as they did in the first round of this competition they come good so I think they will win today.


PakPassion.Net Thanks very much Geoff for your time, appreciate that.

Geoff Lawson Pleasure