ISLAMABAD: While terming the experience held by some Zimbabwe players of featuring in the Pakistan Super League (PSL) invaluable, assistant coach Dion Ebrahim on Saturday said that his team will be targeting victory in the forthcoming T20 tri-nation series in Pakistan.

“We [as a team] have been working for over a year, and we have played competitive cricket [during this period]. We are looking to win the [the T20 tri-series] with the ambition to compete and win,” Ebrahim said while talking to reporters at the Islamabad Club ground.

“We want to play the brand of cricket that is exciting and appealing for fans [in Pakistan] to support us. It’s like taking two steps ahead in the lead-up to the T20 World Cup [in February-March].”

Zimbabwe will be competing against Pakistan and Sri Lanka in a tri-nation T20 series starting in Rawalpindi with a match between Pakistan and Zimbabwe on Tuesday. All the games of the event will be staged in Rawalpindi.

Members of the Zimbabwe squad practised at the Islamabad Club ground on Saturday. The Pakistan team, meanwhile, held an extensive training session at the Rawalpindi Cricket Stadium.

On whether the PSL experience of players like Brendan Taylor and Sikandar Raza will be important for Zimbabwe in the forthcoming tri-series, Ebrahim said that the knowledge held by these players would be vital.

“There is a slightly different climate [in Rawalpindi]. So, the experience of these players of playing in PSL is going to be invaluable for us,” the coach said.

Answering a question, he said that the Zimbabwe squad was excited to participate in the tri-nation series.

“Our squad, which has a number of youngsters coming over to Pakistan for the first time, is very excited to play this tri-series. We are excited for the challenges ahead.”

Responding to a query on whether Zimbabwe would be targeting any specific Pakistan batter like Babar Azam or Fakhar Zaman, Ebrahim categorically said that they were eyeing all the opposition players.

“In T20s, if you put your [complete] attention on one player, you lose sight of the unfolding game in front of you. Both Babar and Fakhar are world-class players, we respect them, but we have plans and strategies for all the [opponent] players,” he said.

The assistant coach praised his bowling attack. “We have got [pacer] Richard Ngarava, who is world-class and has shown time and again in T20 cricket that he’s the best. Then we have young, explosive, dynamic athletes as well, so we are very excited,” Ebrahim said.

Published in Dawn, November 16th, 2025