In 2004-05, Chelsea romped home to their first league title in 50 years. The League Cup was also secured for good measure in what would be a groundbreaking and record breaking season at Stamford Bridge. Cynical observers will no doubt point to Abramovich’s billions as the sole reason for success that season and in the coming years but that would be to undermine the influence of the self proclaimed Special One, Jose Mourinho.

Under the tutelage of first Bobby Robson and then Louis Van Gaal, Mourinho had acquired the best of both worlds; a brilliant tactical mind and the type of man management skills that would make players run through brick walls for him or at least most of them. The Portuguese would go on to become the most successful manager in the club’s history before falling out with the Russian oligarch and leaving the club in 2007.

Mourinho would go on to bigger things and firmly cement his reputation as one of the best managers in the business. Things would not be so rosy though in London; in the four years that would follow, Chelsea would try a host of different managers, five to be specific. Some short term and others who would have their reigns reduced to being short term. Only Carlo Ancelotti would come close to matching Mourinho’s success but at a club like Chelsea, with the kind of money invested, coming close was not good enough.

When all else failed, Chelsea turned to a man who was slowly building his reputation as Mourinho 2.0. Not so much in personal demeanor or style of play but in the career path that he had forged for himself.  Andre Villas-Boas had served as assistant coach and chief scout to Mourinho at Porto and Chelsea respectively. Seemed like the perfect fit. Like Mourinho, he was from Portugal. Like Mourinho, he had never played football at the highest level. Like Mourinho, he had tasted European success with Porto as manager. Unlike Mourinho, he was looking for a new gig after only 9 months at Chelsea.

This brings us to Azhar Ali and his ascension to ODI captain. The same Azhar who has played a grand total of 14 ODIs. The same Azhar who last played an ODI over two years ago. The same Azhar who was not even worthy of a place in the squad for the recently concluded World Cup. Welcome to Pakistan cricket.

This is not the first time a player has been pulled out of wilderness and been made captain and in all likelihood will not be the last. His leadership abilities – his record in domestic is pretty decent – should be an afterthought when you take into consideration that his spot in the side as a regular member can justifiably be questioned.

Limited number of appearances in the shorter format means that a definitive judgment cannot be passed but one cannot help shake the feeling that he will struggle to score runs quickly as evidenced by a career strike rate languishing in the mid 60’s. Given the dross that is our batting line up, does he deserve a chance? Sure. Should he be made captain as well? Yeah, throw the poor guy under the bus while you are at it. Not only will he have to deal with the pressure of fighting for his own spot but will have the added the added pressure of making sure that the other ten are fighting for the same cause and not with one another.

The only reason one can empathize with PCB is the severe paucity of options. There may potentially be better choices – Fawad Alam and Sarfraz Ahmed – out there but there is no standout candidate. And the player the board had initially backed (Hafeez) as the long term successor, has not quite turned out to be the player or the leader for that matter, they were hoping for.

Reading Shahryar Khan’s comments, one gets the feeling that Azhar’s appointment had more to do with how he is perceived to be the closest thing possible to Misbah as opposed to his actual playing ability: reliable, dignified and controversy free. If that is indeed the case, Misbah’s enduring legacy may turn out to be how he changed a whole country’s perception of leadership.

Only time will tell whether Azhar Ali meets the same fate as Andre Villas Boas or follows in the footsteps of Misbah.