Friday, October 20, 2023
ISLAMABAD: Both Pakistan and Australia are focused on getting their World Cup campaigns back on track and hoping to win the ongoing ICC Men's Cricket World Cup 2023 in India where the match between the Green Shirts and the Aussies will be played at Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore today (Friday).
Grant Bradburn, Pakistan's head coach, stressed that the team is ready to avoid rushing into the gaps to beat the five-time world champions.
Pakistan, who were beaten by arch-rivals India in their last match, have won two of the three matches they have played so far. Meanwhile, the Aussies will be hoping to secure their fourth tournament after losing two out of three matches in the mega tournament.
Early reports from Bangalore (India) suggest that the wicket has some grass on it which could support the seamers in patches.
"There is a bit of grass on the wicket as we experienced on Thursday night. You never know what the condition will be on Friday morning but there is a chance that a quality bowler will extract some bounces from it," said a Pakistan team official. upon contact, he said.
In a video interview, Bradburn urged the team members to be at their best against Australia. "So far we haven't been able to jump like we should have. We didn't bomb with the right line and length. There will be very little margin for error and every member of the playing XI will have to be at their best against Australia."
He added that Pakistan will have to seize the game at crucial moments.
"We need to use the key moments of the match to tip the balance in our favour. I think the first impression from everyone was great, it's quite a small place. The boundaries are short here and the playing conditions look very good,” said Bradburn.
“We've done our homework on the ground - it's quite a high-scoring ground, which probably has more to do with the size of the boundary, which is 63-64 metres. The batsmen really enjoyed the opportunity to get onto real surfaces and the bowlers enjoyed it too as there was quite a bit of bounce.
“It will be a place where the batsmen will really enjoy coming on and the bowlers will also be asked some really serious questions. I don't think there will be much margin for error on this wicket. As a bowling attack, we haven't been as accurate as we'd like to be lately, and that spot is going to require some discipline and accuracy,” the head coach said.
Speaking about the match against India in Ahmedabad that did not yield favorable results, Bradburn said: “There is always pressure on the team to win. last few days too. I think the Ahmedabad experience was fantastic. It provided some crucial insights that will benefit the team at the tournament.”
“It was a great opportunity to learn and grow from the whole experience of playing in front of a very large, hostile audience. It's unusual to play in front of a crowd that's pretty much, you know, only for the opposition. However, it was nice to hear the silence at times when we were batting well.
“We had some really good honest conversations yesterday as a group about how we'd like to take the game more and we had an opportunity to be a bit more assertive with the bat earlier.
"As a result, we got under a little bit of pressure and then you know, we just didn't have enough to really apply pressure in the second inning." However, that doesn't change the fact that as a group we also recognized that we weren't putting enough balls into good areas.
“We've also got some amazing insights into the venues – the ball wears out quite quickly and looks like it's been chewed up by a dog after about 20 overs. Obviously, this means the ball will be a bit softer, making it harder to score in the later stages.
"It also brings more reverse [swing] to our advantage. So all those elements are good learnings for us to take on board."
Australia dominated Pakistan in the 50-over World Cup, winning six of their ten matches. But the last match in the format between the two sides saw Pakistan win 2-1 in the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup Super League series.
Pakistan, Bradburn said, have not been deterred by their past record and are all set for Australia's challenge, eager to make it 3-1 before moving to Chennai for their back-to-back matches against Afghanistan and South Africa.
"It's a collection of 150 of the best cricketers on the planet and there are 10 worthy teams," he said. “So, and as we see in the last week, anyone can beat anyone. We did our homework on Australia. We know what they can contain, we know their style of play, we know what their strengths are and we know where we could use them.
“But most of all, we look in the mirror and make sure we're being true to ourselves by challenging each other in the right way.
"We're a tight unit and we support everyone in this group, but we're definitely getting more comfortable challenging performances and roles at different stages of the game. As a group, we recognize that we haven't put together a real performance." so far in all three disciplines, but we know that when we do it, it's a beautiful thing.”
