da poker： There may be little for Pakistan to play for in Jaipur, apart from theclichéd pride and a morale-boosting win going into the first Test
da doce： George Binoy16-Nov-2007
Pakistani batsmen failed to bat around Mohammad Yousuf in Gwalior and paid a heavy price in the form of a series-loss © AFP
There may be little for Pakistan to play for in Jaipur, apart from theclichéd pride and a morale-boosting win going into the first Test, but the touring batsmen will have to rallytogether to match a confident Indian line-up and avoid a 4-1 defeat in theone-day series.Though Shoaib Malik blamed defeat in Gwalior on his opening bowlers failing torein in a vintage Sachin Tendulkar, the initiative had been lost earlier inthe day, when their batsmen failed to bat around Mohammad Yousuf, who was leftstranded on 99.Yousuf had a strike-rate of around 90 throughout his innings and formedsubstantial partnerships of 51 for the third wicket with Younis Khan, and 94 forthe fifth wicket with Misbah-ul-Haq. Pakistan had another steady partnershipwhen Malik added 78 for the second wicket with Younis but they didn’t score 300 because the set batsmen got outprecisely when it was time to accelerate.Malik tried to up the ante and was bowled by Zaheer Khan. Yousuf joinedYounis and began to efficiently anchor the innings. The ideal blueprintwould have been for the batsmen at the other end to play the aggressor whileYousuf built his innings at a run-a-ball. However, both Younis and Misbahlost their wickets when the partnership was just lifting off the ground.Shahid Afridi’s failure to fire also left Yousuf in a familiar dilemma; whether torisk his wicket trying to accelerate, or continue the anchor role andsee Pakistan through to a reasonable total. As it turned out, Pakistanfinished with 255, a difficult total to defend under normal, dewy conditionsand impossible with Tendulkar on a rampage. Gwalior wasn’t the first time the batsmen failed to support Yousuf in theseries. In the first game in Guwahati, Yousuf scored 82 off 88 balls on asluggish pitch but received little support and, at Kanpur, Salman Buttbatted nearly 47 overs for his hundred but Pakistan still fell short by 46 runs Gwalior wasn’t the first time the batsmen failed to support Yousuf in theseries. In the first game in Guwahati, Yousuf scored 82 off 88 balls on asluggish pitch but received little support and, at Kanpur, Salman Buttbatted nearly 47 overs for his hundred but Pakistan still fell short by 46 runs.Treating the batting order like a pack of cards after each match hasn’t helped either. Kamran Akmal opened in the first two games butwas shunted to No. 7 and 8 in Kanpur and Mohali. Afridi was promoted toopen in the third ODI after batting at No. 5 and 7 in the first two. He waspushed back to No. 5 in Gwalior while Malik put on the opener’s boots afterbatting at No. 5 and 6 in the first three games.It doesn’t just sound chaotic. It was.Butt has called for openers to be identified and persisted with but thatideology should apply to the rest of the order too. Making a policy changefor a final one-day match of a series might seem like too much trouble ahead ofthe Test series but if Pakistan were to plot out a batting plan with morestability rather than flexibility, bordering on instability, they couldperhaps take some positives out of this one-day series after all.Their batsmen, free of pressure in Jaipur, playing clearly defined roles -the opener, the anchor, the aggressor, the finisher – while allowing forchanges according to the match situation, might just bring out the chutzpahthat’s been sorely missed.Things might not go according to plan, but you do need a plan.