ABU DHABI: Skipper Azhar Ali and his charges are looking for a clean sweep when they take on West Indies in the third and final one-day at Shiekh Zayed Stadium here on Wednesday (today). Since their 4-1 rout against England last month, Pakistan have raised the bar, winning six consecutive matches: all of them one-sided. Their progress has been built on consistent performances from the top order, apart from captain Azhar. The biggest upshot for Pakistan is their improvement in the ODI rankings as they strive to gain automatic qualification for the 2019 World Cup.
Leading the three-match ODI series 2-0, Pakistan look favourite to win the third and final contest. They beat an off-colour West Indies by 111 and 59 runs respectively in the first two matches with complete dominance. Pakistan will replace West Indies at number eight in rankings if they win 3-0 and displace their opponents to ninth. Hosts England and top seven teams in one-day rankings will get direct berths in the 2019 World Cup while the rest vie for the remaining two places in a qualifying tournament.
Pakistan’s head coach Mickey Arthur has set his team’s goal at attaining top four position in the one-day rankings. Arthur, who replaced Waqar Younis as head coach in May this year, said Tuesday top four rankings was the goal. “We don’t want to think that we have won the series so back off because we have got so many more goals as a one-day unit to achieve and to be amongst the top four is one of them,” said Arthur, also a former South African and Australia coach. But for Athur it’s a work in progress, as Pakistan slumped to ninth after losing to Bangladesh and England twice since the 2015 World Cup. “We have to continuously push the players as a group. We will keep hammering them so they keep getting better. We have to make sure to keep ticking off our goals that we set for ourselves and only then will we be comfortable that we can be get into the top, not eight, but in the top four and then sustain that so we have a lot of work to do to get there.”
It has been more than two weeks since West Indies landed in the United Arab Emirates, and are yet to win a game against Pakistan. West Indies, World T20 champions six months back, are now on the brink of their second successive whitewash of the tour. West Indies’ batsmen have looked out of place, despite showing some resistance in the second ODI. Fifties by Darren Bravo and Marlon Samuels sparked a comeback but the West Indies bowlers lacked penetration and had conceded far too many earlier in the day. Phil Simmons’ sacking just before their UAE tour didn’t bode well for the team either but with a gruelling Test series on the horizon, West Indies need to pick themselves quickly.
Arthur was specifically pleased with Pakistan reducing the percentage of dot balls in batting. “It’s very pleasing to see us meeting those challenges. We had 36 percent dot balls the other night (second one-day match on Sunday) which is nearly the best since I have been coaching,” said Arthur. Pakistan had a 48 percent dot balls during their 4-1 one-day defeat in England in August-September. Arthur believes Pakistan had put West Indies under pressure in the series. “I would like people to write that we played well rather than say the West Indies were playing poorly because they are a good team and we put them under pressure,” said Arthur. Arthur hoped out-of-form skipper Azhar would fire. “Watching him bat in the nets Azhar is hitting the ball very, very well,” said Arthur of Ali who was dismissed for a first-ball duck and nine in the two matches. “He just needs a start and some time out in the middle and runs will come.” The two teams will play three Tests after the one-day series, the first starting in Dubai (a day-night Test) from October 13.
Pakistan have lost seven ODIs out of their last nine in Abu Dhabi over the last three years. They haven’t lost as many ODIs in any other venue during this period. West Indies have not won an ODI in Abu Dhabi. They lost all three to Pakistan in 2008. Two Pakistan batsmen have scored hundreds in three successive ODI innings -Zaheer Abbas and Saeed Anwar. Babar Azam scored hundreds in the first two ODIs of the series.
Squads:
Pakistan (possible): 1 Azhar Ali (capt), 2 Sharjeel Khan, 3 Babar Azam, 4 Shoaib Malik, 5 Sarfraz Ahmed (wk), 6 Umar Akmal/Mohammad Rizwan, 7 Mohammad Nawaz, 8 Imad Wasim, 9 Wahab Riaz, 10 Rahat Ali, 11 Hasan Ali
West Indies (possible): 1 Kraigg Brathwaite/Evin Lewis, 2 Johnson Charles, 3 Darren Bravo, 4 Marlon Samuels, 5 Denesh Ramdin (wk), 6 Kieron Pollard, 7 Jason Holder (capt.), 8 Carlos Brathwaite, 9 Sunil Narine, 10 Sulieman Benn, 11 Alzarri Joseph.