3 min readUpdated: Mar 21, 2026 01:47 PM IST
The musical chairs of Pakistan coaching jobs seem to be a never-ending one. Former World Cup-winning coach with India and Test Mace winner with South Africa, Gary Kirsten, who tried his luck in the Pakistan coaching job, revealed that the level of interference and noise from the outside at this level was surprising to him. Kirsten was handed a two-year contract in the Pakistan white-ball set-up; however, he could only manage to stay in the job for six months, after which Jason Gillespie, who was the red-ball coach, stepped in as a quick-fix to manage the white-ball tour to Australia.
“The thing that surprised me more than anything was the level of interference. I don’t think I have ever seen it at that level before. Did it surprise me? I don’t know, but it was significant,” Kirsten said while speaking to talkSPORT Cricket.
“It is quite difficult for a coach to come and formulate a way that you can work with the players when there is just this constant noise from the outside. It was tough, just this constant noise from the outside and a lot of punitive actions around poor performance and stuff like that,” Kirsten said.
“As a coach, you are the lowest hanging fruit when the team isn’t going well, so let us get rid of the coach or let us put a restriction on the coach because that is the easiest thing to do when the teams are performing and that is kind of counterproductive in my view,” Kirsten added.
Gillespie case
Gillespie, who was also the head coach of the Pakistan national team for 9 months after being appointed in 2024, said that the Pakistan Cricket Board’s decision to sack Tim Nielsen as high performance red-ball coach without zero communications left him completely humiliated and hastened his exit from the team.
“I was coaching the Pakistan Test side. The PCB sacked our senior assistant coach with ZERO communication with me about it- as Head Coach I found this situation completely unacceptable,” Gillespie wrote on ‘X’ when asked by a user why he had left his role with the Pakistan Test team. “There were a number of other issues which left me completely humiliated,” he added.
In April 2024, the PCB appointed Gillespie as the head coach in red-ball cricket and former South African batter Gary Kirsten was roped in for a similar role in white-ball formats. However, Kirsten’s resignation in October later that year followed Gillespie’s in December, when Nielsen was communicated by the PCB that his services would not be needed before the tour of South Africa 2024-25. A former head coach of the Australian team, Nielsen was appointed as the high performance red-ball coach in August 2024.
