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Pakistan captain Babar Azam is hoping that their strategy that worked well during the ICC T20 World Cup will also bear fruit against Bangladesh, despite a big change in the nature of the wickets.
Babar interacted with the media in a virtual press conference on Thursday, where he said that the team will not make a huge change in technique and approach.
“After practice, what I learned is that scoring runs will not be easy here like in UAE. What we need to do well here is to keep wickets in our hands, so that we can capitalise at the end. We took that strategy during the World Cup, and it worked for us. We will follow the same plan here. We will try to keep wickets in hand as much as we can. That will be effective,” he said.
Babar is now the highest-ranked batsman in the ICC T20I match player rankings, but he feels he has more areas to improve.
“There is always room for improvement, and I think I am not perfect. I analyse my performance after every match and find that I do make 50-60% mistakes on the ground. I try to correct myself; I never think that I am 100% right. New challenges come every day, new places, new conditions. I have to adapt to all the challenges. There is no end to learning,” said the right-handed batsman, who was the highest scorer of the T20 World Cup 2021.
Babar has played in the Bangladesh Premier League in the past and believes that experience will help him understand the surface better.
“I have played a few matches in Dhaka before. The wickets are a bit on the slower side. Spinners get help from the surface,” said the Pakistan skipper.
Pakistan were eliminated from the World Cup in the semi-finals after winning all five games in the Super 12 stage, and the next edition, which will take place in Australia, is less than a year away.
Babar said that he will try to test the bench strength and some new combinations in the series against Bangladesh.
“We want to carry the momentum which we gained from the T20 World Cup. Here (in Bangladesh), and after we have three more T20Is against West Indies, we will try a different combination, will test our bench strength throughout these six matches. We can’t also leave out our main cricketers as the Test series is there,” he said.
Though Bangladesh had a completely opposite experience during the T20 World Cup as they lost all the five super 12 matches plus one against Scotland in the preliminary round, Babar is still not writing off the opposition’s chances,
“It’s their home series. We can’t take them lightly. They are missing some top cricketers, but those who are left are also good. They all play in the BPL. We can’t take them lightly,” Babar told the media.
Spectators will enter the stadium after almost two years in this series, and the home team will be enjoying the support from the crowd, but Babar also expects that they will also get some cheering.
“Whenever we went for training, people cheered for us seeing our bus. They stood in the queue to watch us train. It’s a great thing that the crowd is allowed for the first time after the covid situation. We will enjoy the full house as a team and hope that some of them will cheer for us as well,” said the Pakistan captain.
