Wasim Akram Predicts Pakistan's Collapse Against England

Wasim Akram saw Pakistan’s England collapse coming long before the first ball was bowled. He didn’t dress it up. He didn’t reach for diplomacy.

“I knew before the series we were going to lose 3-0 to England,” the former captain told The Athletic, with Pakistan already 0-2 down and clinging to the faintest of hopes before the third and final Test on Wednesday.

Their performances so far have proved him right. England have dominated, Pakistan have barely landed a punch.

“Our batting is struggling, our bowling is below average and our fielding is worse. It’s not rocket science,” Akram said.

This is a man who knows what it looks like when Pakistan travel to England and impose themselves. He was central to the sides that won three consecutive Test series there in 1987 and 1996, captaining the last of those triumphs. Those teams were hard, disciplined, and ruthless in key moments. The current one, in his eyes, is none of those things.

Shockwaves from PCB’s drastic overhaul

If the cricket has been poor, the reaction from the Pakistan Cricket Board has been even more dramatic.

In the aftermath of the second Test, the PCB swung the axe. Seven players were sent home from the touring squad. Head coach Sarfaraz Ahmed and his entire staff were removed. A full-scale clear-out in the middle of an away series, with one Test still to play.

The moves stunned the wider cricket world. Even in a country used to upheaval, this felt extreme.

Akram, though, doesn’t let the players off the hook.

He says he feels for them, but insists attitude is part of the rot.

“In Pakistan we have a saying: ‘You can only clap with two hands’,” he said. The problems, as he sees them, run far deeper than one bad tour or one failed coaching team.

“I get asked all the time, ‘Can you do something to help Pakistan cricket?’ But the issues are a lot deeper. These are the top players, there’s nothing else there. The systems aren’t there below that.”

He points squarely at the domestic structure, a long-running fault line in Pakistan cricket.

“The first-class structure domestically has been all over the place the last few years and there’s no consistency, no patience.”

The instability, he believes, seeps into everything — even the stands.

“That dribbles down to the fans, too. They see the team lose and they want to rip it all up, too. We’ve done that so many times and now there is nothing really left,” Akram said.

It’s a bleak assessment from one of the game’s greats: a national setup stuck in a cycle of panic, with no solid base beneath its star names.

Akram’s worry for Imran Khan

Away from the field, Akram’s words carried an even heavier weight when the subject turned to his former captain and long-time friend, Imran Khan.

He hasn’t spoken to Imran for three years, and from a distance he watches the political and legal turmoil surrounding the former prime minister with growing unease.

“I haven't spoken to him for three years. It's so unfortunate, politically, what's happening with him. The court of law is the court of law. But as far as his health is concerned, there can be no compromise on that,” Akram said.

There are campaigns abroad, he noted, to improve Imran’s conditions. At home, he isn’t so sure.

“There's a movement in England and elsewhere (to improve Imran's conditions) but here (in Pakistan)? I'm not so sure,” he said. “I'm speaking from the heart as someone who is worried about him as a person. Convicted or not convicted. Jail or no jail. We need to safeguard his health. We don't know what's happening, the government are saying his health apparently is fine. But I'm worried. I miss him a lot.”

One of Pakistan’s greatest fast bowlers, looking at a crumbling Test side and a fraught political landscape, sounds less like a pundit and more like a man issuing a warning: about a broken system, and about a country’s duty to one of its most iconic figures.