The top-order batting failures are becoming a serious burden on Misbah-ul-Haq and his Pakistan team, which relied on an aggressive assault from fast bowlers Mohammad Irfan and Wahab Riaz on Sunday to narrowly avoid a third consecutive loss at the World Cup.
Pakistan’s best opening stand of the tournament so far is 11 runs in the opening match, when Ahmed Shehzad scored 47. Pakistan was all out for 224 chasing 301 to win. Against the West Indies, a reshuffled Pakistan lineup lost its first wicket without scoring and quickly slipped to four wickets down for one run. Ultimately, Pakistan was all out for 160 chasing 311 to win. Another reshuffle didn’t make much difference against Zimbabwe, with Pakistan batting first but still losing its first wicket with one run on the board and slipping to 4-2 when Shehzad was out.
That brought skipper Misbah to the crease for another salvage operation. Misbah, who scored 76 against India, batted through 42 overs for his 73 against Zimbabwe before he was out.“That is being a problem for us, unfortunately,” Misbah said. “If you lost confidence once, it could be really difficult for you as a batsman to just come out of that, and unfortunate that our top order is just in that kind of mental state. So it’s really difficult for me, also, and the lower — and the middle-order batsmen to just keep on going like that.”
The problem for the top order has been the difficulty in adjusting to the pace and bounce of the pitches in Australia. “These conditions are not easy,” Misbah said. “Whoever is batting at the top, especially with the quality bowling lineups, two new balls, if you are not confident enough and you are not in the runs, it could be really, really horrible for you, and that’s what’s happening. But if we really want to win against South Africa and we really want progress in this World Cup, we have to come up with some performances,” he added.