Pakistan head coach Mickey Arthur feels disappointed as their batsmen failed to play their proper roles in the big game against India in the Group A clash of the ongoing Asia Cup 2018.
After deciding to bat first, Pakistan batting faced trouble from the very beginning. Both the Pakistan openers Imam-ul-Haq (2) and Fakhar Zaman (0) fell very early in the innings as Pakistan went down to 3/2 in 4.1 overs.
Later, the next two batsmen Babar Azam and Shoaib Malik tried to rescue the team with their brilliant 82-run partnership for the third wicket. But once that partnership was broken, the Pakistan batting collapsed and they were bundled out for just 162 runs in 43.1 overs.
Disappointed Arthur claimed that the Pakistan batsmen didn’t play according to their respective roles. He said, “We sort of batted outside our roles, which was very disappointing. Imam-ul-Haq, it’s not his role to be running down to Bhuvneshwar Kumar in the third over. It’s not Sarfraz’s (Ahmed) role to be hitting over the top and getting caught out there. We’ve got X-Factor guys whose role it is to do that.
“If Fakhar (Zaman) gets out playing that way, it’s OK. If Asif (Ali) gets out like that it’s OK, because that’s his role. But the other four batsmen certainly need to take responsibility.
“(It was) the pressure that told on Imam. As I said, out of his role, he had 2 off 8 balls or whatever, but Fakhar had just faced a maiden. He tried to have a go, he tried to hit the ball that’s not in his area. I do think there was a little bit of pressure.”
Chasing down that target, Indian openers provided the brilliant starts and the team chased down the target successfully in just 29 overs after losing just both the openers. Arthur also feels that the Pakistan bowlers went outside their plans far too quickly that helped the Indian team to chase down the target without any panic.
Arthur said, “On a wicket like that, you need to strike really early if you’re going to defend it. We didn’t strike early enough. But, saying that, we went away from our plans too quickly. We said that our batters batted outside our roles and that wasn’t acceptable.
“With our bowling, we went outside our plans far too quickly. We wanted to bowl hard lengths, hit the top of off stump. It was tough to score then. There was a bit of panic when they didn’t strike early. We panicked and went away from our plans.”
Earlier, Pakistan started their journey in this tournament with a thumping victory against Hong Kong while the Indian team faced difficulties before securing a close victory against Hong Kong. However, Arthur believes the Indian cricket team was hugely disciplined on the field during the Wednesday’s game against Pakistan.
Arthur added, “India played better than us today. They put us under pressure for longer periods of time. They were probably quite good for the hit-out last night and they got a little bit of a scare. They certainly came out, and their discipline was so much better. We saw what a difference (Jasprit) Bumrah makes to the attack. I thought their spinners bowled well, and their lengths were much better than last night. I think they were better for their hit-out.”
On this Sunday (September 23), India and Pakistan will meet once again in this tournament in the Super Four round.
