Who is the favourite in Pakistan-England test series?

With England due to play Pakistan from 17^th January onwards, most of the cricket crazy fans would be considering England as firm favourites to demolish Pakistan in the Emirates. Having beaten them in both test and ODI series back in July-September
2010, the Three Lions will definitely start as favourites in what is meant to be a home series for the Green Shirts.

When Pakistan travelled away to UK for their series against Australia and England, Mohsin Khan’s team were unable to whip aside Andrew Strauss’s England. They were defeated 3-1 in tests and 3-2 in ODI’s. However, after the recent World Cup in the sub-continent
excluding Pakistan, the Green team has been on song, and haven’t lost a single test series under the captaincy of Misbah-ul-Haq.

Pakistan travelled away to the Caribbean Island to take on Darren Sammy’s West Indies and emerged as comfortable winners before tearing apart Zimbabwe in the one-off test. Pakistan’s next assignment was against Srilanka in Dubai/Abu Dhabi, and the Green
Shirts emerged as 1-0 winners in tests and 4-1 in ODI’s.

Mohsin Khan’s team than travelled away to Bangladesh for the full series and once again emerged as winners of both tests and ODI series. Currently, Pakistan team are on a winter break and will return to action on January 17.

On the basis of current performance, Pakistan are considered favourites to win the series especially with the likes of spin trio; Saeed Ajmal, Muhammad Hafeez and Abdul Rehman in their squad. The three spinners have been in top form recently, and have been
the main stay of Pakistan’s setup.

England are fresh from a 5-0 whitewash in the ODI’s against India and keeping in mind their current form in the subcontinent, Andrew Strauss’ team is bound to have trouble in UAE where the conditions will more or less be the same.

The only worry for the Pakistan team will be their wicket keeping department. Even though, Adnan Akmal is a capable keeper but he might not be as effective with the bat as Matt Prior would be for England.

Otherwise, both teams look balanced on paper and a great series is on the cards. It won’t be wrong to say that the Pakistan team are in with a huge opportunity to avenge their loss to England when they visited them in 2010.

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Posted by Taha Habib on Jan 7 2012. Filed under Pakistan, Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry