Article Posted on 17 October, 2023

Pakistan’s bowling has been one of their main strengths but that seems a bit unlikely since they have been hit with the absence of Naseem Shah in their World Cup squad.

Naseem Shah was ruled out of the entire World Cup with an injury to his shoulder which he picked up during the Asia Cup. Pakistan selectors then picked Hasan Ali in the squad as Shah’s replacement.

The onus will be on Shaheen Shah Afridi and Haris Rauf to step up and give Pakistan key breakthroughs on wickets which have so far shown little assistance to the bowlers as seen in the warm-up matches.

Pakistan entered the Asia Cup as the top-ranked ODI side, but for them there have been few areas of concern which will need to be addressed if they want to lift the trophy for the second time.

During the Asia Cup, they were beaten by a big margin by their archrivals India and then got edged out by Sri Lanka by the barest of margins as the Babar Azam-led side couldn’t make it to the final of the six-team tournament.

Pakistan’s spinners including the likes of Shadab Khan and Mohammad Nawaz haven’t quite been able to make inroads during the middle overs which creates a bit of a question mark going into the tournament.

"We know we have lapsed in fielding and in our wicket-taking abilities in the middle overs but we are going to work on it and hopefully will not be repeating them," Babar had said before leaving for India.

However, the Pakistan captain was adamant on lifting the trophy. "The top-four is a small goal for us. We want to come out as winners," he said.

For Pakistan to get to the top rankings in ODIs, their top three batters in Imam-ul-Haq, Fakhar Zaman and Babar Azam had played a crucial role in getting to that point.

However, Fakhar Zaman has been struggling for runs at the top of the order, though Pakistan will back him to come good and deliver some match-winning performances at the big stage.

Pakistan will also require the top-ranked batter in ICC ODI Rankings Babar Azam to score big runs and further establish himself on this big stage.

Despite Pakistan players are playing in India for the first time, Babar Azam feels the conditions are not very different with the odd exception of Chennai, where the ball spins a bit more.

"Although we have not played in India before, we are not under any pressure," he said. "We have done our research and we have heard the conditions are quite similar except maybe in Chennai where spinners get a lot of help."

Pakistan lost both their warm-up games against New Zealand and Australia which were played in Hyderabad.

Both games were high-scoring, which indicates the bowlers will have to come up with different plans to pick up wickets of the opposition.

Pakistan will play their first game against Netherlands on October 6, while they will face archrivals India on October 14 at Ahmedabad.