PAKISTANIS have been facing a number of problems these days in the shape of energy crisis, water crisis, food crisis and the list goes on. Even then almost every Pakistani seems to forget all his grievances and problems and prays for the victory of Pakistan in a cricket match against any team, particularly India.
But it seems that another crisis has been added to the list of crises, i.e. the cricket or more appropriately the batting crisis.
However, even this source of happiness is being snatched from the Pakistanis as our team has mostly performed below par, in the batting side at least.
In the most important match against India, Pakistan, first of all, made the wrong decision by electing to bat first after winning the toss, despite knowing the fact that all the previous three matches played on Premadasa ground have been won by the team batting second.
Moreover, when it is common knowledge that India are very good at chasing any total, the decision to bat first made no sense at all.
Further, the Achilles heel for Pakistan has been its batting. But Pakistan has constantly tried to further strengthen its already strong bowling by playing Saeed Ajmal, Raza Hassan, Shahid Afridi, Umar Gul, Yasir Arafat and Muhammad Hafeez who all bowl well.
Playing with seven specialist bowlers despite having weak batting line-up is beyond anyone’s comprehension.
On the other hand, India went out with mere four specialist bowlers, trusting in its part timers to fill the gap of 5th bowler.
Many cricket experts said that Abdul Razzaq, who could have been a very productive player for Pakistan, should have been included in the playing 11, but he was ignored for no good reason.
Even though Razzaq’s absence is being felt, there is no doubt that all Pakistani batsmen are capable of playing good cricket, but they come under great pressure once they lose a pair of wickets.
What Pakistan needs today is not a coach or manager, but an expert psychologist who could work on our players so that they can deal with pressure on the field.
The PCB should make efforts to help players deal with pressure when they are batting in an international match. Further, playing 11 should be selected keeping in view the fact that it’s our batting that we need to improve, not our bowling.
This must be done to ensure that Pakistanis are not deprived of this probably the only source of happiness they have.
IMDADULLAH SHAIKH Larkana