Sarfraz Ahmed, Pakistan's ODI and T20 captain who led the team to victory at in the 2017 Champions Trophy, will now also captain Pakistan's Test team, announced Chairman Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) Sheheryar Khan on Tuesday.
Addressing a ceremony celebrating Pakistan's Champions Trophy 2017 victory at the Prime Minister's House, Khan congratulated Ahmed and the team before making the announcement.
Ahmed will now captain the Pakistan side in all three formats of the game. He replaces Misbah-ul-Haq, who played his last series in and against West Indies earlier this year.
Addressing the ceremony earlier, Chairman PCB Executive Committee Najam Sethi said that the West Indies and Sri Lanka teams will visit Pakistan after the World XI event in September. "These are not just promises, actual negotiations are underway and you will see the results soon," said Sethi.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif praised the cricket team's performance, saying, "You are the real heroes, you are the prime minister, you brought honour home."
He expressed hope that the cricketers sitting in front of him would go on to make history like their predecessors. He also likened the condition of the team after their initial humiliation against arch-rivals India in the first match of the tournament to the condition of the country in 2013, when the PML-N came into power.
He also regaled the audience with cricket stories from his life, remarking at one point that he was more distraught at being refused to play cricket at a ground he frequented in his youth than he had been by the Panamagate JIT.
The prime minister also frequently used cricketing metaphors, seemingly to brush off the mounting political pressure on him. He said he would not tolerate too many bouncers and would send them for fours and sixes whenever he got the chance.
