Pakistan fielding coach, Julien Fountain provides his thoughts on the mindset of some players who continue to be selected despite being poor at fielding

By Julien Fountain (9th February, 2014)

When you are faced with players who get selected at national level but do not have the requisite level of competency in their secondary or tertiary skills (batting or fielding), what is the correct course of action? Train them up or deselect them (despite their expertise in their primary skill area).

If the player arrives at the national team level, without the requisite level of competency, surely that is due to the standard of cricket and/or coaching that player has been exposed to prior to his selection at national level? Your national team is only as strong as your domestic structure, simple.

It begs the question "Why are you still picking international players who are poor fielders?" (Unless its actually acceptable in Pakistan to be good at your primary skill, but poor in your secondary / tertiary skills).

If a player doesn't want to field well, he can never become a good fielder but really, how is it possible, now, today in 2014, that you can have players selected who's attitude is like that? Fielding is a crucial part of the game and has been for quite a while.

Somewhere, there is a contradiction happening, and until that contradiction is corrected (if that’s possible) those "alleged" fielding issues are going to remain. Pakistan is known as a batting and bowling nation, not a fielding nation. Why is that? Yes there are grass roots issues, but they have been identified, both by myself and by countless others. Now they need correcting. You can keep putting your finger in the holes in the dam, but at some stage you are going to need to build a completely new dam!

I have collected game statistics on Pakistan v Opposition fielding for the last two years, and these show clearly which players field well, and which players make mistakes; but if you keep picking those players who make fielding mistakes because their primary skill is the important thing, then all that can be done is try to help those particular players improve, as it is what the team requires of them. However, don't then whinge about poor performances when the player messes up at a crucial moment in their secondary or tertiary skills.

Attitude is everything and if the player in question feels that they are invincible, and that attitude is not discouraged, but actually encouraged by their coaches, fans and media, then what are you supposed to do? Its ok to bang on about how important fielding and fitness is, but when push comes to shove, if nobody has the courage to stand up and call a spade a spade and actually institute change, then that quote (wrongly attributed to Albert Einstein) surely comes to the fore: "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing, over and over, and expecting the results to be different!"

Discuss!