Ahead of his side’s ICC Cricket World Cup match against Afghanistan, Pakistan batter Imam-ul-Haq defended his team’s disappointing performances in bowling, saying that though there is no room for excuses, the conditions have been batting friendly and there have been many high-scoring matches in the tournament so far.
Pakistan will lock horns against Afghanistan in Chennai. Afghanistan is at the bottom of the table with one win and three losses, but Pakistan is also in rough shape with only two wins but two big losses to India and Australia. They are in the fifth spot in the points table.
At the pre-match press conference, Imam-ul-Haq said about his team’s bowling, “See, if you see here, all matches are very high scoring. It is not that it is only against our team. If you look at the other teams also, they are scoring 350–360; like yesterday, there was a score of 400 between England and South Africa, so it is not that only our bowlers are being beaten.” “The grounds here are small, the wickets are good, and when the batsmen are set, the margin for the bowlers is very low.” “This is not an excuse, but the conditions are such. And it is true that sometimes there are ups and downs for the bowlers, but Shaheen, like in the last match, I thought they would score 420 or 430, but our spinners and end bowlers performed very well and controlled them at 360. So, in patches, our bowlers have done very well, and Shaheen has done very well. So, these are a few positives, and during the day you only look at the positives; we try to ignore the negatives because it is very important—we have back-to-back matches in this tournament. On the day we are bowling well, we have to back this,” the batter concluded his point.
Imam-ul-Haq admitted that indeed, after two big defeats, the morale of the team is down, but ups and downs are a part of the sport.
