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Pakistan assistant coach Azhar Mahmood, while addressing a press conference ahead of the second Test against England:
Pakistan's Pitch Strategy:
"We had a clear plan of what pitches to prepare for Bangladesh, and what to prepare vs England. Our approach was pace wickets against Bangladesh and spin pitches against England. Our instruction to the curator for the first Test was that the ball should spin after the second day. But the pitch didn't take turn until even the fifth day. Hopefully, the ball will begin to take turn on the ninth day."
Need for Taking 20 Wickets:
"You have to take 20 wickets. We thought about how we're going to take those. We thought that if we use that pitch, the thinking was how do we take 20 wickets against England, and we thought spin was the way to do it."
Experienced Players in the Lineup:
"The players who are coming in are experienced. They have been playing first-class cricket for a while. The best option is to play players at home on pitches they are used to, so I don't think there'll be that much pressure on that."
Pitch Preparation Strategy:
"We left a lot of grass on the pitches and wanted the ball to turn to use the pitch in our favour. Let's see if it works for us."
Fast Bowling Under New Management:
"If you look at the fast bowling, this was the third Test under new management. Before that, we were also struggling as we wanted to know how to get 20 wickets. So now we think we have more options with spin. There were also a few niggles. Naseem had a few niggles, and Shaheen was playing a lot of cricket. So we decided to rest him."
Pakistan's Pitch Strategy:
"We had a clear plan of what pitches to prepare for Bangladesh, and what to prepare vs England. Our approach was pace wickets against Bangladesh and spin pitches against England. Our instruction to the curator for the first Test was that the ball should spin after the second day. But the pitch didn't take turn until even the fifth day. Hopefully, the ball will begin to take turn on the ninth day."
Need for Taking 20 Wickets:
"You have to take 20 wickets. We thought about how we're going to take those. We thought that if we use that pitch, the thinking was how do we take 20 wickets against England, and we thought spin was the way to do it."
Experienced Players in the Lineup:
"The players who are coming in are experienced. They have been playing first-class cricket for a while. The best option is to play players at home on pitches they are used to, so I don't think there'll be that much pressure on that."
Pitch Preparation Strategy:
"We left a lot of grass on the pitches and wanted the ball to turn to use the pitch in our favour. Let's see if it works for us."
Fast Bowling Under New Management:
"If you look at the fast bowling, this was the third Test under new management. Before that, we were also struggling as we wanted to know how to get 20 wickets. So now we think we have more options with spin. There were also a few niggles. Naseem had a few niggles, and Shaheen was playing a lot of cricket. So we decided to rest him."
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