Pakistan have nothing to lose and should come back hard at SCG

[Dr_Bassim]

Most of the times Pakistan has always gone into the 3rd test either with a defeatist mindset or knowing they have already lost the series.

Yes, in this instance the same story shows itself.

But something is wonderfully different.

For the first time this team has competed at great lengths with the Australian team.

Asad Shafiq gave the Australians a due scare by showing his batting prowess in pulling off a miraculous 490 runs with help of 4 lower order tailenders.

The 2nd test Pakistan amassed 450 runs batting first on a track which had appreciable movement and bounce. They blew away the advantage because of inexperience but still hitting 450 runs in two consecutive tests was a monumental achievement.

Azhar Ali cemented his place as the best test player for Pakistan.

Even though the mood might be slightly despondent, Pakistan have nothing to lose anymore.

Their captain Misbah is about to probably retire at the SCG so should come back hard at the Aussies. Younis also seems like he is one innings away from striking a rich vein of form.

Add that to the brilliant talent Babar, Pakistan should definitely look to turn it around.

Especially if Australia decide to rest Starc or Hazlewood. Yasir also becomes a strong contender at SCG because conditions will definitely be to his liking and we all know he can put in world class performances.

We are still 2-0 down and I tend to agree that situation is not much different from ATG teams of the past, but at least the tests have lasted 5 days instead of being all over in 4.

Because of the above mentioned reasons, I strongly feel Pakistan will give Australia a good challenge in the SCG.

And who knows.

They might even pull it off.

 

[Kianig89]

Good optimism but we have blown away 2 chances already I hope Misbah retire s before Sydney will be a learning experience for a young player

 

[fast1975]

M
But something is wonderfully different.

really? what is different?

let me help you a bit more

here is 1972
http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/current/match/63095.html

then 2010
http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/current/match/406200.html

and now 2016

nothing has changed sarkar. same familiar collapses from no where

 

[wasim-fan]

While one can appreciate the optimism, this is absolutely third grade Aussie team. So while consolations are comforting, they might be a stretch. Aus team is joke of test side even at home

 

[Junaids]

Who is this Younis who is one innings away from a rich vein of form?

Is it Waqar Younis?

What I do know is that it's not the lost old man who is practising as hard as he can, but has lost to advanced age the reflexes to cope in Australia or even New Zealand. Mind you, there are two of them in the team.

 

[Big Mac]

Misbah should aim to overtake Lara's highest test score and in the process he will have the 500 runs necessary to contend for that coveted GOAT status

 

[Tired]

I hope YK fails miserably in Sydney so he is forced out

 

[Sachin136]

Scoring 450 on a pitch like this is hardly a major achievement.

 

[Pete Rose]

Scoring 450 on a pitch like this is hardly a major achievement.

neither is it a minor achievement for a team that passed 400 for the first time in australia in over 20 years, just last week

 

[Buffet]

I just think that 400+ score on back of 2 batsmen going big would have given a lot more confidence to Pakistani batting line up than tail slogging runs and then reaching to 400+.

With only one batsman going big and tail adding runs did take Pakistan to 400+, but Pakistan top order didn't bat well as unit. If top order bats well as unit for 1-2 matches then it inspires a lot more confidence. Handing tests out to NZ and Aus when you are in good position to draw is simply due to lack of confidence.

 

[troodon]

The way Aus batted showed how poor Pak batting was on that flat track.

Though Pak scored 440, it was not enough on that highway. Aus easily passed it in double quick time and put the pressure back on Pakistan.

The way Aus scored seems to have shattered the confidence of Pak and that showed in their 2nd innings batting.

The result in SCG will also be the same. I don't think Pak believe they can compete after this innings defeat.

 

[Miandad_fan_number_one]

Extremely disappointing from Pakistan. I am normally optimistic for the team but the predictive nature of them and the ability to collapse and get out to very average deliveries. Leaves me with no confidence for the scg test. That with the bowling attack that has one bowler who bowls well but surprisingly can't get a wicket and three bowlers who performed miserably.

 

[MRSN]

While one can appreciate the optimism, this is absolutely third grade Aussie team. So while consolations are comforting, they might be a stretch. Aus team is joke of test side even at home

Exactly. Pakistan blown away the perfect chance of winning a series in Australia. I doubt they will get such a weak team next time they tour Aus.

 

[Deewana Mastana]

What's a demoralised team going to take to their next game?

 

[ego-gambit]

Most of the times Pakistan has always gone into the 3rd test either with a defeatist mindset or knowing they have already lost the series.

Yes, in this instance the same story shows itself.

But something is wonderfully different.

For the first time this team has competed at great lengths with the Australian team.

Asad Shafiq gave the Australians a due scare by showing his batting prowess in pulling off a miraculous 490 runs with help of 4 lower order tailenders.

The 2nd test Pakistan amassed 450 runs batting first on a track which had appreciable movement and bounce. They blew away the advantage because of inexperience but still hitting 450 runs in two consecutive tests was a monumental achievement.

Azhar Ali cemented his place as the best test player for Pakistan.

Even though the mood might be slightly despondent, Pakistan have nothing to lose anymore.

Their captain Misbah is about to probably retire at the SCG so should come back hard at the Aussies. Younis also seems like he is one innings away from striking a rich vein of form.

Add that to the brilliant talent Babar, Pakistan should definitely look to turn it around.

Especially if Australia decide to rest Starc or Hazlewood. Yasir also becomes a strong contender at SCG because conditions will definitely be to his liking and we all know he can put in world class performances.

We are still 2-0 down and I tend to agree that situation is not much different from ATG teams of the past, but at least the tests have lasted 5 days instead of being all over in 4.

Because of the above mentioned reasons, I strongly feel Pakistan will give Australia a good challenge in the SCG.

And who knows.

They might even pull it off.

They should have chased 124 last time they toured Australia if they have not been able to draw weather affected game then it's doubtful of fluke in last match chasing 450

 

[Statsman]

Younis also seems like he is one innings away from striking a rich vein of form.

This gave it away doc. )

 

[itsme]

Hope younis somehow score his 10k runs so we can get rid of him and misbah

 

[khurram39]

They must think on their bowling line up who can took 20 wickets while observing no change in batting line up.

 

[omer28]

first objective should be a draw

Pakistan should not even think about winning . If they could some how draw a game that would be a huge achievement considering they have lost 13 consecutive matches in australia . The probelm is that its gg to be as tough as winning . A team like australia has a very positive approach and they will rather loose a game then drawing it .

To be honest even though this s by far one of the weakest australian test side in years , In their conditions they are much better than pakistan. lets be realistic here , pakistan has not competed as hard as many of the people believe

1) in the first test , pakistan came close to the chase was because we had no pressure on us , It was a lost game . Please dont forget that australia declared and they still had 5 wickkets left , If they would have been super docile like pakistan , they would have amassed a lead of 600-700 runs by playing out slowly . they wanted to win and thats why they gave pakistan 2 days to chase the runs just to ensure that even weather could not save pakistan . Most of the runs were score by our tail which is very unusual and is not going to happen that often .

2) In the second match our weak bowling line up was exposed , The only reason we were winning in uae was because of our spinners who had been effective because they had the luxury to defend 400-500 runs all the time . If you look at that stats of uae , pakistan has been very lucky with the toss as well , misbah has won the toss in 70% of the matches and its always an avantage to bat first in " uae" conditions . We were lucky that younis khan had been in the form of his life in " uae " conditions . He has been our main match winner in those conditions . His biggest strength in test matches is his ability to rotate strike and once he gets set , you can be rest assured that he will make it count and not throw his wicket away . he could make big hundreds and stay at the crease for days . Also our strategy did work in a way in uae conditions . We were super defensive and usually played at 2 runs an over on the " flat" wickets on the uae . the strategy was to consume as many balls as possible without worrying about the strike rate and then try to capitalize when opposition pacers got tired in their third and fourth spells and we are good at playing spin in our conditions and the reason we attack the spinners is because that is our bread and butter , pakstan knows that if they wont score against spin , there is no way of setting a formidable target. Yasir
shah has been very lucky that he was often bowled on the fourth and fifth day
on wearing pitches with uneven bounce , that suits his style of bowling , since he is not a big turner of the ball , he is a variation bowler and relies on uneven bounce , also the fact that he usually has 400-500 runs to defend also helps him tremendously . In overseas conditions he was neutralized and once that happened , misbah dint know what to do as the pacers are quite ordinary

3) With such an imbalanced side for these conditions there is just no way that pakistan can win a match . its good to support your team and be optimistic
but realistically they dont seems to have a chance . This is the worst pace attack i have ever seen from a pakistani side , I would hate to admit but even the indian pacers look better than ours . Yasir shah is a very over rated spinner and can not be compared to mushtaq ahmed and danish kaneria specially in overseas conditions . I cant think of one occasion when he has performed well under pressure . its a shame that despite scoring 443 runs you are left with a proposition of saving the test on the 5th day in a rain curtailed match which was at best 3.5 days . The australians managed to score at almost 5 runs an over while scoring 624 runs .. what a shame . This is very demoralizing , i dont think pakistan has the right team to compete in these conditions .. 3-0

 

[omer28]

first objective should be a draw

Pakistan should not even think about winning . If they could some how draw a game that would be a huge achievement considering they have lost 13 consecutive matches in australia . The probelm is that its gg to be as tough as winning . A team like australia has a very positive approach and they will rather loose a game then drawing it .

To be honest even though this s by far one of the weakest australian test side in years , In their conditions they are much better than pakistan. lets be realistic here , pakistan has not competed as hard as many of the people believe

1) in the first test , pakistan came close to the chase was because we had no pressure on us , It was a lost game . Please dont forget that australia declared and they still had 5 wickkets left , If they would have been super docile like pakistan , they would have amassed a lead of 600-700 runs by playing out slowly . they wanted to win and thats why they gave pakistan 2 days to chase the runs just to ensure that even weather could not save pakistan . Most of the runs were score by our tail which is very unusual and is not going to happen that often .

2) In the second match our weak bowling line up was exposed , The only reason we were winning in uae was because of our spinners who had been effective because they had the luxury to defend 400-500 runs all the time . If you look at that stats of uae , pakistan has been very lucky with the toss as well , misbah has won the toss in 70% of the matches and its always an avantage to bat first in " uae" conditions . We were lucky that younis khan had been in the form of his life in " uae " conditions . He has been our main match winner in those conditions . His biggest strength in test matches is his ability to rotate strike and once he gets set , you can be rest assured that he will make it count and not throw his wicket away . he could make big hundreds and stay at the crease for days . Also our strategy did work in a way in uae conditions . We were super defensive and usually played at 2 runs an over on the " flat" wickets on the uae . the strategy was to consume as many balls as possible without worrying about the strike rate and then try to capitalize when opposition pacers got tired in their third and fourth spells and we are good at playing spin in our conditions and the reason we attack the spinners is because that is our bread and butter , pakstan knows that if they wont score against spin , there is no way of setting a formidable target. Yasir
shah has been very lucky that he was often bowled on the fourth and fifth day
on wearing pitches with uneven bounce , that suits his style of bowling , since he is not a big turner of the ball , he is a variation bowler and relies on uneven bounce , also the fact that he usually has 400-500 runs to defend also helps him tremendously . In overseas conditions he was neutralized and once that happened , misbah dint know what to do as the pacers are quite ordinary

3) With such an imbalanced side for these conditions there is just no way that pakistan can win a match . its good to support your team and be optimistic
but realistically they dont seems to have a chance . This is the worst pace attack i have ever seen from a pakistani side , I would hate to admit but even the indian pacers look better than ours . Yasir shah is a very over rated spinner and can not be compared to mushtaq ahmed and danish kaneria specially in overseas conditions . I cant think of one occasion when he has performed well under pressure . its a shame that despite scoring 443 runs you are left with a proposition of saving the test on the 5th day in a rain curtailed match which was at best 3.5 days . The australians managed to score at almost 5 runs an over while scoring 624 runs .. what a shame . This is very demoralizing , i dont think pakistan has the right team to compete in these conditions .. 3-0

 

[JibranAnsari]

we should try to draw this test match and that could only be done by scoring a lot of runs. Dont think we have good enough bowling to take 20 wickets. The best we could hope for a draw , but i expect us lose by a very big margin.

 

[omer28]

am not too bothered about the ranking system to be honest . I think its time for " misbah " to retire now , younis should stay for atleast one year . Form is temporary class is permanent . They should give a new batsman a decent run atleast for 8-10 test matches ( babar azam) seems to be talented and should improve . I think they need to find the right balance in the team . They do need one aggressive opener to unsettle the opposition pacers , all the 7 batsmen can not play the same game . they should have individual roles in the team irrespective of whether they lose or win they will improve in the long run

they do need a good all rounder in the side , if they dont have one , they will have to develop one , he doesnt necessarily have to be a strike bowler . even finding a good accurate bowler ho can contain batsmen will help . As that would provide sufficient rest to pacers to be more effective in their second and third spells
the reason australia scored so many runs at such a rapid pace was because we dint have a 5th bowler who could do the containing job . I am not advocating sohail khan , he is not the right bowler for these conditions . you need another good bowler to start with aamir who can maintain pressure . Asif should have been given a chance in this series , we knew before hand that our fast bowling reserves were very low . he should have been tried . Irfan would have been handy in these conditions , but its a gamble playing him in tests because of fitness issues . If i was pakistan and really wanted to give me the best chance on these pitches . I would have gone with 5 bowlers

1) amir
2) asif
3) irfan
4) wahab
5) imad wasim

asif and amir to open the bowling , first change irfan ( i would have used him sensibly ) giving him 4 overs at a time and not bowling him more than 10-12 overs in the day ( because of fitness issues) . wahab also only 4-5 overs short bursts .. to buy me a wicket with full aggressive bowling ... when wahab bowls longer spells he loses his efficacy , 4-5 over spell is the most he can bowl aggresively at a time . asif could have bowled longer spells and imad would have done a good containment job and providing adequate rest to fast bowlers . If you can recall in the world cup in australia teams struggled to get more then 250 with irfan / wahab and co but this attack could have been devastating , i would have been surprised that with the right captaincy this attack would have posed serious problems to this inexperienced batting line up

 

[kingusama92]

SCG was always Pakistan's best chance of winning.

The conditions are suited to Asian teams. Does it mean we'll win? I don't see how that's going to happen considering the team flopped while being in a strong position.

 

[Itachi]

Scorecard doesn't tell the true picture.

440 score was a good one. But it was sheer brilliance of one man with a little support here and there. Sohail khan made a big difference but you can't expect that from him most of the time.

So even though it was a 400+ score, the vulnerability was right there. Australia just exploited on the basis of what they learnt in Pakistans first innings.