Misbah-ul-Haq optimistic about better results in the limited-overs series

Misbah-ul-Haq, the Pakistan captain, is disappointed after losing the Test series against South Africa by an embarrassing margin of 0-3 but feels that not playing enough Test matches is the reason behind his team’s downfall.

After being thrashed by the home team in Johannesburg and Cape Town, the visitors failed to compete against Graeme Smith and company at Centurion and lost the third Test by a huge margin of an innings and 18 runs.

While speaking to reporters after the match, the Pakistan captain expressed that as compared to other cricketing nations, the Green Shirts get to play very few Tests, which hamper their growth at the ultimate stage of the sport.

“Not playing as much Test cricket as other countries. We are only playing four or five Tests a year. That’s a big worry,” said the Pakistan captain.

Despite losing the Test series, the middle-order batsman is happy with the performance of a few individuals, who rose to the occasion when their team needed them to. The skipper was all praise for Asad Shafiq, Younis Khan, Rahat Ali and Saeed Ajmal.

If all these players had combined better as a unit, Misbah feels that the results in the Test series could have been different.

“The way Asad Shafiq played is one of them,” he expressed. “There were centuries by him and Younis Khan. Rahat Ali took six wickets here. Saeed Ajmal took ten in Cape Town. We performed in patches but we needed to put together performances as a team.”

While speaking about the upcoming limited-overs series, the cricketer from Mianwali claims that the Green Shirts will look a completely different team in the shorter formats of the sport. With some fresh players coming from Pakistan to join the squad for the limited-overs series, Misbah is positive about better results.

“It is a different story when you play in a different format,” Misbah added. “It will be really good to have new players come in. They come in with fresh minds and that will really help the team.”

Pakistan team is surely going to be bolstered by the inclusion of Shahid Afridi, Shoaib Malik, Kamran Akmal and Umar Akmal in the limited-overs side.

Short URL: https://www.newspakistan.pk/?p=38533

Posted by Yasir Hashmi on Feb 25 2013. Filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.