Pakistan looks to thrash UAE to bury demons of India def

DHAKA: Coming jubilant from UAE following successful holding of Pakistan Super League (PSL), but the men in green conceded a humiliating defeat from arch-rival India in their Asia Cup opener, which they would want to forget as soon as possible starting with a big victory against minnows UAE when the two teams clash on Monday here in Mirpur.’For its part, Pakistan was taken by surprise at the way the pitch played on Saturday,’ Shoaib Malik said after Pakistan was defeated by India.Pakistan slipped and slid to 83 against India, Sarfraz Ahmed’s 24-ball 25 the only innings of substance. Mohammad Amir put in a fantastic spell at the top of India’s innings to keep Pakistan in the game, but only just.’We made some mistakes. We didn’t know what the conditions here would be. Now we have played, now we know how to deal with it,’ said Malik on the sidelines of the Pakistan team’s training session on the afternoon before the match.’We had miscalculated. It wasn’t a typical T20 wicket where you look at 170 or 180. We know we have the best attack among all teams. But the batsmen have to take responsibility. Whoever gets in has to score 60-70, so the team ends up scoring 140-150, which the bowlers can defend.’We should have scored 130. We had two run outs. Otherwise one of them might have gone on to score 40-50. Here, 130-plus is a great score, unless the conditions change.’ It’s unlikely that Pakistan will be worrying too much about its bowling. Amir, as well as Mohammad Sami, bowled extremely well against India, while Mohammad Irfan troubled India’s batsmen no end. Wahab Riaz did, however, have an average day, but it could well have been an aberration.Like with UAE, it’s the batting that Pakistan has to address. And fast. Both Sri Lanka and Bangladesh have already beaten UAE and India could too, going by form. So winning on Monday is non-negotiable for Pakistan. But the idea must be put up a big performance – with the ball, of course; even more so with the bat. Since qualifying for this level in 2014, UAE has played three Twenty20 Internationals against Test-playing nations, two of them in this tournament and one against Zimbabwe earlier. To its credit, UAE have gone about it manfully, bowling well and showing good spirit on the field. Sri Lanka was restricted to 129 for 8 and Bangladesh for a similar 133 for 8. But with the bat UAE has fallen behind. Teams (from)Pakistan: Shahid Afridi (captain), Anwar Ali, Iftikhar Ahmed, Imad Wasim, Khurram Manzoor, Mohammad Amir, Mohammad Hafeez, Mohammad Irfan, Mohammad Nawaz, Mohammad Sami, Sarfraz Ahmed (wk), Sharjeel Khan, Shoaib Malik, Umar Akmal, Wahab Riaz.UAE: Amjad Javed (captain), Ahmed Raza, Fahad Tariq, Farhan Ahmed, Mohammad Naveed, Mohammad Shahzad, Muhammad Kaleem, Muhammad Usman, Swapnil Patil, Qadeer Ahmed, Rohan Mustafa, Saqlain Haider, Shaiman Anwar, Usman Mushtaq, Zaheer Maqsood. (PPI)’