Pakistan’s head coach Sarfaraz Ahmed has admitted that the team’s recurring batting collapse is a problem the coaching staff has identified and discussed with batsmen, yet it continues to happen series after series.
Speaking after Pakistan’s 90-run defeat to West Indies in the first Test at Tarouba on July 28, Sarfaraz said the batting unit let the team down once again.
“Humara bahut jaldi collapse ho jaata hai jiski wajah se team ko bahut zyada nuqsaan hota hai.”
Our batting collapses very quickly, which causes immense damage to the team.
Sarfaraz Ahmed, post-match press conference, July 28, 2026
He added that they have identified the issue and spoken to the batsmen about it. That admission is the real story. Not because a coach acknowledged a weakness. Because this is the sixth time in ten months that Pakistan’s batting has folded in the same way, and the coaching staff’s own words confirm they have known about it the entire time.
The numbers across this period tell a consistent story. Against South Africa in Lahore in October 2025, Pakistan lost five wickets for 16 runs in the first innings and seven for 48 in the second. In Rawalpindi, the last five fell for 17 in the first innings and six for 42 in the second. Against Bangladesh in May 2026, five wickets fell for 11 runs in Dhaka. Pakistan lost that series 2-0, their second consecutive whitewash to Bangladesh in two years.
Against West Indies in Tarouba, Pakistan were 244 for 3 with Shan Masood on 109 and Imam-ul-Haq having made 63. Then the last seven wickets fell for 38 runs. Justin Greaves finished with 5-27.
In the second innings, chasing 211, the pattern repeated. Pakistan slumped to 71 for 9 before Babar Azam’s unbeaten 58 from 107 balls became a footnote in a 90-run defeat. Jayden Seales took 5-20.
“We were disappointed with our batting. Too often our batting line-up has failed in the second innings.”
Sarfaraz Ahmed, post-match press conference, July 28, 2026
Pakistan have now lost eight consecutive away Tests, the longest such streak in the country’s history. The run started in Australia in December 2023 with a 3-0 whitewash, continued through South Africa in early 2025, Bangladesh in May 2026, and now West Indies. It has been three years since Pakistan last won a Test match outside their own country.
The Problem Pakistan Has Identified But Cannot Fix
What makes Sarfaraz’s admission different from the usual post-match disappointment is the specificity. He did not say the team played badly. He said they have identified the collapse pattern, spoken to batsmen about it, and it still happens.
Five different coaching setups have overseen Pakistan’s red-ball cricket since 2022. Each inherited the same fragile batting lineup. Each identified the same problems. None solved them. The collapse against West Indies followed an identical template to every series before it: a solid start, a platform built, then total disintegration once the first middle-order wicket falls.
The systemic nature of the issue points beyond individual batsmen. Pakistan’s domestic cricket structure was overhauled in 2019 when the PCB abolished the departmental system, removing the livelihoods of over 400 first-class cricketers. The pipeline that once produced Test-ready batsmen has been disrupted, and the pattern of coaches and selectors failing players at the structural level is visible in every overseas scorecard.
Sarfaraz hinted at changes for the second Test, saying Saud Shakeel and Abdullah Shafique are available for selection. But the issue is not about which batsmen are picked. It is about a batting culture that has produced the same result six times in ten months regardless of who walks out to bat.
Insider Read
A batting collapse on a scorecard reads like a sequence of individual failures. From inside the dressing room, it is one continuous event.
When a team is 244 for 3 and two quick wickets fall, the next batsman does not walk out into a normal situation. He walks out carrying the energy of a dressing room that has gone from calm to silent in five minutes. His batting plan is the same as it was an hour ago. His body is not. Feet move a fraction slower. Hands grip a fraction tighter. The delivery he would have left alone at 244 for 3, he plays at because he feels the need to do something.
This is what a coach cannot fix by identifying the problem. You can show a player video of his dismissals. You can tell him to trust his defence. But the moment the scoreboard reads 260 for 6, the team meeting means nothing. What takes over is instinct. And instinct in that situation is survival, not batting. Teams with strong batting cultures have players conditioned through long domestic first-class innings to trust their game under pressure. Pakistan’s current lineup has not had that conditioning. The domestic system that once provided it was dismantled in 2019. What remains is a group of batsmen who are technically capable at 244 for 3 and mentally exposed at 260 for 6.
Sarfaraz knows this. His admission confirms it.
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