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Pakistan has abandoned its search for a foreign coach for its national cricket team and have settled for Wasim Hasan Raja. In some respects he too is a foreign coach in that he lives in England and has been doing so for many years. Perhaps this may enable him to bring a more detached view to his assignment though his first job would be to get to know the Pakistan players. As a player, Wasim Raja was an exciting left-hand batsman, a brilliant stroke player who was inclined to be a bit too brilliant and thus was not able to fulfil his promise. Though I remember well the century he made in Jalandhar in 1983. He had come into bad when Pakistan looked to be in trouble and he had steadied the innings before launching an onslaught. It was hot and humid and I was ``roasting'' in the tiny commentary-box, the table fan had to be switched off because its whirring was interfering with the broadcast but the sweltering weather was forgotten as we watched, spell-bound, Wasim Raja's innings. I was and am very fond of him though he was a difficult man, preferring to be a loner. The other players would say that he was not a team-man. But I got on famously with him and when I was manager of the Pakistan team to England in 1974, I made it a point to look after him and keep him motivated.

Only time will tell whether he is the right choice to be a coach of the national team. He's certainly got the credentials but it remains to be seen how he inter-acts with the players. Test players are not school-boys, though many of them may be young but they are playing at the highest level. Wasim Raja will have to set the ground rules on how he will deal with them. Wasim Raja has been a school teacher. He should know that the best way of getting the most out of his charges is to be their friend. That's the right way of ensuring that you will get the maximum out of them. And he must not get embroiled in the ``politics'' of the game. He's been hired as a technocrat. And that's how he should function, without prejudice and pre-conceived notions, with a clean slate, a blank sheet of paper and an open mind.