Former Australia cricketer turned coach Jason Gillespie, who recently quit as Pakistan’s head coach in Test cricket, said on Monday that he stepped down after being “completely and utterly blindsided” by the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) as well. Gillespie, whose contract was about to expire in 2026, resigned last week and he expressed his frustration over the lack of communication, which made him feel that the PCB no longer wanted him in the role.

“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,” Gillespie told ABC Sport. “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.”

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“Tim Nielsen was told that his services were no longer required and I had absolutely zero communication from anyone about that,” Gillespie said. “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.'”

Adding to Jason Gillespie’s frustration was the fact that the feedback given to him about Nielsen and the team’s performance was positive.

“I developed a really close relationship with the Test captain, Shan Masood, and felt we were certainly going in the right direction and things were going really well,” he said. “All the feedback that I’d got or the feedback the PCB got was just how effective, you know, Tim had been in his role as well and the players were getting a lot out of him.”

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However, Gillespie guided Pakistan to a 2-1 win against England in October, after losing the first match by an innings and 47 runs. And, after the loss in the first Test, he was informed that a new selection panel would be introduced, and he would not be a part of it as well. He also felt his role as head coach was diminished and even stated that he often didn’t know the team lineup until the day before a match as well.

“I felt I was basically hitting catches and that was about it on the morning of a game,” he said. “You want to be able to have clear communication with all stakeholders, with selectors, for instance, knowing what the team is as head coach well before the game, or before at least the day before the game.”