EXCLUSIVE: Owais Shah Lifts The Lid On His Rifts With Former England Coach Andy Flower

Former England, middle-order batsman Owais Shah, has said that he did not have any rift with former England coach Andy Flower, but the latter probably did not like him. It is notable that Owais last represented England in the ICC Champions Trophy 2009 and even after performing well in the tournament, he was never seen wearing the England jersey again.

It led to some reports in the media suggesting that the England head coach at that time who happened to be Flower, had a feud with Owais Shah which led to the demise of the latter’s international career. Now, speaking exclusively to CricketAddictor.com, Owais Shah has said there were no rifts between the two, but the former coach probably didn’t like him that much as he liked the other players.

Owais has also said that he was extremely disappointed with the way he was treated even after amassing a lot of runs for England.

Owais Shah Opens Up On Rifts With Andy Flower

“I didn’t have any rift with Andy, he had his views. I was actually playing some of the best cricket I have ever played. I scored a 98 against South Africa and also got few runs against Sri Lanka. I actually thought that at that point I was playing my best cricket. I think Andy maybe had different ideas and again I didn’t perhaps fit into his ideas,” Owais said.

“I was also told that they are going to drop me. We went back to England and I was dropped stating that I wasn’t consistent enough in the last 6-12 months which is strange because I had the most runs in the last 6-12 month in ODI cricket for England. Kevin Pietersen was our best batsman and I had more runs than him in ODI cricket so I wasn’t really sure where Andy was going with it. I don’t know..maybe he just didn’t like me,” Owais added.

Owais Shah Remained An Unsettled Figure In The English Team

Owais Shah never really sealed a spot for him in the England setup. Although he went on to play 71 ODIs for the English team, he could never really settle for longer stints. He made his ODI debut in 2001, and after a few games, he was dropped from the team. His Test debut came in the year 2006 and even after performing exceptionally well in his Test debut, he had to wait for almost 15 months to get a chance in his second Test match.

Also Read: Exclusive: Owais Shah Names The Best Batsman In International Cricket So Far