"Absolutely zero communication.." Jason Gillespie opens up on his resignation as Pakistan's test coach

Jason Gillespie was appointed Pakistan’s test coach in April this year.

In his first public interview following his resignation as Pakistan’s test coach, Jason Gillespie revealed that the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) ‘s “absolutely zero communication” regarding the non-renewal of Tim Nielsen’s contract as the high-performance coach was the final nail in the coffin for his decision to step down from a role that he had taken only in April earlier this year and was contracted to run until 2026.

In a not-at-all surprising event, Gillespie resigned as the Pakistan test coach earlier this month, less than a couple of months after Gary Kirsten resigned as the white-ball coach, expressing his frustration over the lack of communication from the PCB.

I was completely and utterly blindsided: Jason Gillespie

While there were other issues already in place over the last few months between the Australian and the PCB, the final straw was PCB’s refusal and non-communication to Gillespie about renewing Nielsen’s contract.

Gillespie told ABC Sport, “There were certainly challenges. I went into the job eyes wide open, I want to make that really clear. I knew that, you know, Pakistan had cycled through a number of coaches in a pretty short space of time. The straw that broke the camel’s back, I suppose, was, as a head coach, you like to have clear communication with your employer. I was completely and utterly blindsided by a decision to not have a high-performance coach.

“Tim Nielsen was told that his services were no longer required and I had absolutely zero communication from anyone about that. And I just thought after a number of other things that had gone on in the previous few months, that was probably the moment where I thought, ‘Well, I’m not really sure if they actually want me to do this job or not.'”

Under Gillespie, Pakistan lost a home test series to Bangladesh for the first time and then went down in the first test against England but bounced back to win the series 2-1.

Following the loss in the first Multan test vs England, Gillespie was not included in the selection meeting and was rendered to “basically hitting catches”.

Pakistan have roped in Aaqib Javed as the interim coach in all three formats for now.

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