Pakistan Tour Of Ireland, England and Scotland 2018

I understand Batting was key for England but I would have preferred a bowler getting MOTM award instead of Jos Butler. Yes he scored a brilliant 80 and gave England a little edge but the spells of Broad and Anderson were crucial as well.

Pakistan played really well in first test match but behaved completely different in second. Pakistan yet again drew against England in England which is some fantastic achievement imho. The only thing that worries me even as an outsider is Sarfaraz Ahmed. He might have the cricketing brain and might be leading the troops well but he himself has not been inspirational. Needs to up his batting and he really struggles badly.
 
The squad against Scotland for T20s have been announced and they're going with full strength.

Sarfraz Ahmed (captain), Ahmed Shehzad, Fakhar Zaman, Haris Sohail, Shoaib Malik, Asif Ali, Hussain Talat, Faheem Ashraf, Mohammad Nawaz, Shadab Khan, Mohammad Amir, Rahat Ali, Usman Shinwari and Shaheen Afridi.

No wonder they'll play all seniors against street team too...
 
Perfect Square said:
The squad against Scotland for T20s have been announced and they're going with full strength.

Sarfraz Ahmed (captain), Ahmed Shehzad, Fakhar Zaman, Haris Sohail, Shoaib Malik, Asif Ali, Hussain Talat, Faheem Ashraf, Mohammad Nawaz, Shadab Khan, Mohammad Amir, Rahat Ali, Usman Shinwari and Shaheen Afridi.

No wonder they'll play all seniors against street team too...
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LOL. They are playing Ahmed Shehzad too. So its definitely not a full strength squad.:lol
 
Totally outplayed by England. Azhar, Sarfraz and Asad have been disappointing for a while now. None of them merit a place in the team and i think it’s time we move on.
 
Both sides were a bit underwhelming in all departments. England will be eaten alive by India if they don't maintain their performances and Pakistan will face the same fate if they play South Africa, (depleted) Australia and New Zealand away.

Pakistan bowlers were aesthetically wonderful to watch but weren't as effective as the truly elite bowlers given the conditions. In all honesty I'm not very impressed by Imam although he has only played 3 games, it looks like he's in the team only because of his connections. They can do better than Shafiq too. If they replace the 2 batsmen mentioned with better ones, it'll go a long way towards drastically improving the team. Sarfraz doesn't perform very well 8/10 times but he's the undisputed leader of this team - their source of power. Series team rating - 7.5/10.

England need to replace Cook and perhaps Malan, the rest of their batting seems good. Not sure about the replacement for Cook though, most options have been tried and failed. Rory Burns has been in good form for Surrey and has opened a few times (maybe even in all his innings, not sure). I'm guessing Malan will be dropped when Stokes returns to the XI. As for the bowling department, I don't think Sam Curran will be used against India. If Roland-Jones is fit, he'll be a fantastic option. But it's very unlikely he'll play. Mark Wood seems like the obvious second choice despite his patchy record at test level. He offers something totally different to the other 3 seamers, a bit like how Wagner complements Southee and Boult. Series team rating - 7/10.
 
Damn Scotland are playing well. To get to 50/0 in 4.3 overs against arguably one of the best T20 attacks in the world is beyond luck.

A little worried about the game. Need some quick wickets to push things back in our favour.
 
Ahmad94 said:
Damn Scotland are playing well. To get to 50/0 in 4.3 overs against arguably one of the best T20 attacks in the world is beyond luck.

A little worried about the game. Need some quick wickets to push things back in our favour.
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In the end everything was just fine. Scotland though did play well. More the matches they play, better they get. After the second T20 they go and play the T20 Tri-series with Ireland and Netherlands.
 
Sarfraz's batting talent is wasted if he plays down the order. He should bat more up the order. Doing some research, in ODIs he averages 43 opening, 51 when playing at #4 and 5. However, his average drops to 26 when he plays at #6/7. And it's not like Pakistan's middle order is fully stable. Sarfraz should either bat 4 or 5 or if Pak are still trying to find a good opener Sarfraz can open as well.

A bit odd though, after the 2015 World Cup he was dropped from that position even though he performed well in that spot. If he plays in the middle order, Pakistan can bring in a big hitter in at 6, which would strengthen them.
 
Iodide said:
Sarfraz's batting talent is wasted if he plays down the order. He should bat more up the order. Doing some research, in ODIs he averages 43 opening, 51 when playing at #4 and 5. However, his average drops to 26 when he plays at #6/7. And it's not like Pakistan's middle order is fully stable. Sarfraz should either bat 4 or 5 or if Pak are still trying to find a good opener Sarfraz can open as well.

A bit odd though, after the 2015 World Cup he was dropped from that position even though he performed well in that spot. If he plays in the middle order, Pakistan can bring in a big hitter in at 6, which would strengthen them.
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Fully agree with you but it comes down to Sarfaraz not wanting to add further pressure on himself. This innings was decent but let's not forget the pitch was flat as hell and Scottish bowlers were a little off as well. We have already seen his batting deteriorate heavily because of the captaincy. If you add him as an opener in ODI in place of the likes of Ahmed Shehzad you can position an extra genuine batsmen lower down the order that provides better support to the tail and can clear the boundary at will - the likes of Aamir Yamin comes to mind (although I would rather look for a genuine batsmen rather than allrounder).
 
Shehzad played due to absence of Babar Azam. I have reservations over Hussain Talat. The guy hasn't performed well at all so far and came into the side only because of extra hype. I think Sarfarz is best suited where he is currently playing. He should definitely play up the order but not as an opener.
 
Rehan_24 said:
Shehzad played due to absence of Babar Azam. I have reservations over Hussain Talat. The guy hasn't performed well at all so far and came into the side only because of extra hype. I think Sarfarz is best suited where he is currently playing. He should definitely play up the order but not as an opener.
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Hussain Talat has a lot of promise around him because of his List A domestic alongside his PSL performance. I think he is trying to preserve his wicket at the moment rather than playing his natural aggressive game hence he has lost a little of the edge.
 
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