LAHORE: Pakistan’s Under-19 cricket team left quietly from Allam Iqbal Airport here on Wednesday for its two-month long away tour which includes a 3-nation series in Dubai and participation in the Junior World Cup in Bangladesh which commences from Jan 27.

Talking to Dawn, Pakistan’s junior coach Muhammad Masroor sounded optimistic for a better performance on the tour. “We had organized a 12-day long camp in Lahore and also played some friendly matches and hopefully the hardwork will pay off and the team will perform well in both the upcoming assignments,” the coach said.

In Dubai, Pakistan will play two matches each against Australia and New Zealand before leaving for Bangladesh on Jan 19 for the mega event.

Masroor said though Australia had pulled its team out of the World Cup, their team was visiting Dubai as per schedule.

He said it was strange that Australia was not competing in the World Cup due to security reasons. He said Cricket Australia had also called back their former Test cricketer Stuart Law from Bangladesh where he was working with the BD team as head coach.

To a question, Masroor admitted that he had no input in the selection of the team as his name was also announced as coach after the Pakistan team had beeen announced. He admitted that it would have been better if he had his input but the team was looking a well balanced one.

To a question the coach said team’s spin department was its main strength as it has four leg-spinners namely Ahmad Shafiq, Salman Fayyaz, Shadab Khan and Hasan Khan.

“However the team lacks in the off-spin department where inexperienced Arsal Sheikh is the only choice,” admitted Masroor. Arsal was preferred over the more talented Hadayatullah despite the fact he did not play a single one-day match.

He said Pakistan head coach Waqar Younis had visited the camp twice to give some suitable tips to the players.

He said his first target was to win the World Cup.

Masroor said that as he had also been playing cricket in Bangladesh, so he knows well about the playing condition of that country but the main job would be to take right decisions at right time.

He said in Bangladesh, Pakistan will also play two warm up matches against India and Nepal. He said his first priority as coach would be to qualify for the quarterfinal stage as top teams of the pool, where Sri Lanka, Afghanistan and Canada are included along with Pakistan.

Gohar Hafeez is leading the Pakistan team in both the triangular series and the World Cup.

Team is: Gohar Hafeez (captain), Muhammad Umar, Zeeshan Malik, Hasan Mohsin, Mohammad Asad, Saif Badar, Hasan Khan, Salman Fayyaz, Shadab Khan, Umair Masood, Saif ali, Irfan Liaqat, Sameen Gul, arshal Sheikh and Ahmad Shafiq.

Published in Dawn, January 7th, 2016