Early into the World Cup, Pakistan’s campaign was in danger of disintegrating quickly. But Waqar Younis’ approach of allowing the side time to settle has helped them pull things together and find momentum
Firdose Moonda in Auckland08-Mar-2015Think of the way teams like Australia and South Africa prepared for this tournament. The former beat everyone in sight. The latter took planning to an intricate new level of intensity. Now think of the opposite of all that. That’s what Pakistan did.A string of poor results and selection controversies was how they came into the World Cup and how they started it. They lost eight out of ten games in a build-up period which was marred by selection controversies and then lost their first two games of the tournament too. They got themselves into a situation from which it seemed they would not be able to get out of in time to seriously compete at this tournament.Most sides surrender under that kind of stress. We saw South Africa do it on Saturday, we’ve seen England do it throughout. But Wasim Akram had a hunch Pakistan would be different, based on his experiences 23 years ago.”There is a lot of pressure on them. I remember the 1992 World Cup, and the way we started – pressure was with us as well,” Akram said before Pakistan beat Zimbabwe in Brisbane. “But this is part of the game. They need to get some momentum and try to qualify for the quarterfinals.”Pakistan have been deadline junkies since that tournament, when they lost their opener against West Indies by 10 wickets, beat Zimbabwe, were saved by rain against England, and lost to both India and South Africa before their decent run began. This time, they also waited for what could have been the last minute and got their campaign back on track against Zimbabwe, where it has remained albeit precariously so some of the time.Their batting remains a concern, much more so than the area of the game Wasim was concerned about two weeks ago. “This is an inexperienced bowling attack,” Wasim said. “As we saw against West Indies, in the last five overs they went for 79 runs. The reason is inexperience. It is difficult to bowl in the last five overs with four fielders outside the circle – sometimes impossible if players like AB de Villiers or Brendon McCullum are there.”Pakistan have not run into McCullum yet but found a way to counter de Villiers and his team-mates when it got tight. Targeted aggression, enforced through pace, and smart use of the bouncer from Mohammad Irfan, Rahat Ali and Wahab Riaz cornered South Africa and forced them to play shots they may not otherwise have risked, especially with the required run-rate under control. Pakistan played with desire, which was all coach Waqar Younis wanted to see.”I guess the entire team felt after losing the first two games that it’s about time they should come to the party. It was the start of the World Cup, I guess everybody was just sort of getting in,” Waqar said. Other coaches would not casually brush off a settling-in period with such nonchalance, especially not at a World Cup, but Waqar is allowing Pakistan to do it their way. “Look, it’s a game of cricket. You’re not going to get everything, every day.”On most days, Pakistan don’t get everything. Far from it. Some of the most pressing issues still remain. The rumoured personality clash between Waqar and Sarfraz Ahmed, which kept the latter out of the side until the South Africa game, still attracts attention. Waqar was asked three separate questions about Sarfraz of which the first two were performance related. Waqar confirmed he “never doubted” Sarfraz’s ability and praised the player for doing a “wonderful job.”The third question was about the relationship between them. Waqar bristled, said the press conference was not the time for that kind of question and if such things were going to be asked, he would leave. Then he left.But before the verbal scuffle, Waqar made sure he got a message across about Pakistan’s resilience. The spirit of 1992 does not haunt Pakistan with expectation, the same way the under-performances of the past stalk South Africa. It is there but that is all it is. “I hope it turns out to be the same, but we have to really work hard. Every game in a World Cup is a pressure game. In ’92, Pakistan handled the pressure really well. They had the belief,” he said. “I hope that belief is coming into our dressing room.”
