Shahryar Khan: Woolmer couldn't assert his authority

Inzamam controlled the team, not Woolmer

Cricinfo staff

March 25, 2007

'I kept telling him and Inzamam that for the team to succeed both he and the team needed to be united and as one' © Getty Images

Bob Woolmer, the former Pakistan coach murdered in his hotel room last Sunday, lacked authority and control of his team who, according to Shahryar Khan, a former chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board, revered Inzamam-ul-Haq as the 'unquestioned leader'.

"There were a few confrontations [between Woolmer and the players]," he said in an interview with BBC Radio Five Live. "But invariably Bob did not take umbrage at various players sulking or even addressing harsh words to him because they'd been left out or asked to go home from a series.

"Generally he had a very good relationship with the boys because he took so much trouble," he said. "Being a very gentle person, he would invariably go round and talk to the boys and ask 'why are you being harsh with me'? Nearly always the boys came around."

But Shahryar admitted that though the relationship between the players and Woolmer was generally healthy, the coach was never able to fully impose his authority "because this lay with the captain most of the time."

"Bob worked around it. I kept telling him and Inzamam that for the team to succeed both he and the team needed to be united and as one," he said. "Sometimes there was a little fraying of this. There was always a question mark regarding Bob taking total control of the team in every sense. There was resistance from Inzamam and perhaps successful resistance. Inzamam was the leader, the unquestioned leader of the team.

"They [the players] all fell in place around him and were totally supportive of Inzamam. Bob found it difficult sometimes," he said. "If he was giving advice that may not have been accepted by Inzamam, he sometimes found it difficult. Bob felt he should have had full control of the team but in fact he didn't."

Meanwhile the Pakistan team had arrived in London on their way home from Montego Bay. All the members of the squad were interviewed by the police in Jamaica and gave DNA samples and fingerprints before leaving the Caribbean.

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