Pakistan Test cricket on its way to supremacy – Pakistan v http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Sri-Lanka-c758 – Opinion
Pakistan cricket in a span of almost a year has exhibited tremendous improvement since middle-order batsman http://www.senore.com/Cricket/United-Arab-Emirates-c3033 (UAE) in
2010.
However, he could not lead his team to a series win against the Proteas and had to wait for his third match as the captain of the team which was played against http://www.senore.com/Cricket/New-Zealand-c754 to grab which first victory.
However, right from day one Misbah has insisted that his prime focus is to improve the overall performance of the team and if they win matches along the way its an added advantage.
A captain who is not concerned about win but is more focussed on injecting winning ways in the team is perhaps a better leader for the players to follow.
Nonetheless, a leader who hesitates to take risks vanishes in the dunes of time, so if Misbah wants to immortalise himself, he then needs to take risks when he can see an obvious win, a trait he lacked in the first Test against Sri Lanka in the ongoing three-match
series in the UAE.
Pakistan could have won the series but according to media reports Pakistan coach http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Mohsin-Hasan-Khan-c77595 and skipper Misbah did not want to take risk so they opted to draw the match when Pakistan needed just 170 runs to win the game.
While Pakistan might be taking a sigh of relief, the battle was obviously won by Sri Lanka who avoided a defeat against all odds.
A Captain needs to have faith in his men, but the way Pakistan went for a draw proved otherwise.
However, now the second Test in underway and from the way the first two days have gone, Pakistan are dominating their opponents while Sri Lanka are once again under fire.
Under Misbah there is no doubt that Pakistan have learned how to initiate a Test match, however, it’s the ending that needs work as Pakistan has failed to end their Test matches on a high even after taking a flying start, somehow or the other Pakistan lose
their nerve on the final day which is the area that needs to be given special attention by the team management as the players need to be mentally strong enough to take the brunt of Test cricket on the final day.
The reason why teams like http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Australia-c746 and South Africa are so good in the longest format of the game is the very fact that they never give up till the last delivery and they certainly never go for a draw.
Time and time again, Australia has proved that event Test matches can be played like a limited overs event when time is short with eminent victory ahead.
Perhaps it is too early for Misbah to start taking risks but the sooner the better because if he plans to http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Adrian-Roger-Kirshaw-Pierson-c42135 with his current stature as the captain of the national team he needs to grab easy victories before selectors lose faith in him and replace him
which by the way is the most common practice in Pakistan cricket.
The ongoing three-Test series against Sri Lanka can take http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Pakistan-c755 sky high in Test cricket if they manage to beat the Lankans, but if they fail more criticism is likely to be on its way for a team that has been marred by controversies in recent years.
A dominance in Test cricket would most likely shun those who have been throwing spikes at Pakistan cricket ever since the spot-fixing debacle that ravaged Pakistan cricket and saw the banning of former Test captain http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Mohammad-Amir-c76675 and Mohammad
Asif.
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