3 min readUpdated: Mar 21, 2026 11:57 PM IST
After he took over the Sri Lankan cricket team, Gary Kirsten has opened up about his short stint at the helm of Pakistan cricket team. He pointed out that there was a lot of “interference” in his five-months-long role with the Pakistan Cricket Board, although he did not reveal by whom. He also said that reports that Pakistan cricketers were fined by the PCB for their failure to make it to the semis of the T20 World Cup was not surprising.
“I’m not particularly shocked (by reports of Pakistan players being fined). For me, it’s just sad. I mean, those players are giving their all and I’ve got to know them well. You know, all of them. So I’ve got an emotional attachment to a lot of those guys. I saw them in Colombo and it was great connecting with them again. And they’re good guys. They want to do well for their country. So it’s never nice when you see that,” Kirsten said in an interview with BBC.
Talking about his bond with cricketers as a coach, Kirsten said: “In the end, I just enjoy working with cricket players. And if you have cricket players, whether they’re from England, West Indies, Zimbabwe, Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, they’re cricket players, they’re professionals. We talk the same language. We connect on similar things, and we’re professionals in that space. And you know, I enjoyed the Pakistan players, I did. I thought they were dedicated to the game.”
When Kirsten was asked how he looked back at his brief time with Pakistan, he replied: “It was just five months, six T20 games in total. So, pretty much incidental in terms of an experience.”
“As I’ve journeyed around the world — this is now my fourth international job — you get to experience different levels of interference. And every country has a slightly different way of looking at it. And I think that was the real challenge there, is the level of interference can get quite intimidating, and it can also get quite involved. And sometimes where you have no — or very little — influence as a coach, then what’s the point of doing it? I mean, I only do this job because I want to help a group of people be the best they can be. I’ve been a cricket professional, you know, since I was 20 years of age. I’m now 58. That’s 38 years in the game. The understanding that you could actually add some value there, wherever you go is, for me, really important. And if that is lost and you have no influence, then I don’t see the point,” Kirsten said.
