LAHORE - Pakistan team head coach Waqar Younis terming Champions Trophy qualification main aim has said that the team is fully prepared for Sri Lanka tour to produce better results.
"We have set targets for Tests as well as one-day series and hope that the team does well on the tour to achieve the targets and I am confident that we will qualify for the Champions Trophy," Waqar said this during a press briefing held here Monday at the Gaddafi Stadium before the team’s departure to Sri Lanka.
“Our ODI team is certainly not weak but not as strong as Test side. We’ll try to win maximum matches against Sri Lanka to qualify for Champions Trophy in the ODI series,” he added.
Lamenting the poor bowling attack against minnow Zimbabwe, the head coach termed injuries mean reason behind it. “Yes, there is a dire need to improve bowling department which is struggling against even the weak opponents. We have some pacers who returned the squad and also have some youngsters, so it is hoped that we will do well against Sri Lanka.”
But the former pacer also supported the fast bowlers saying the new conditions were easy and beneficial for the batsmen. “In our era, there were five fielders in the circle but now they are reduced to four which provides more gap and chance to batsmen to score more and more runs and bowlers face a lot of difficulties in this regard.”
Terming the One-day International (ODI) series a significant one, Waqar said: “We need to clean-sweep Sri Lanka who are though tough opponents but not unbeatable. If we play against the Lankan Tigers, keeping in mind a clean-sweep against them, it will be easy for us to achieve our target of qualifying for Champions Trophy.”
Waqar said the previous three years were very tough for Pakistan cricket and injuries were main reasons behind them. “As a coach, there is always pressure on you, it's there even when you are winning. Unfortunately, we have lost five series but you must consider a lot of factors - the biggest of them all was losing Saeed Ajmal. We also didn’t have match winners like M Irfan in the team while Wahab Riaz had also been facing fitness problems."
He lauded the team selection and termed it fair and transparent. “I have nothing to do with the team’s selection and anyone else also didn’t interfere in it, as team selection is the just the selection committee’s job who chose the team purely on merit.
“The players come and go which is a part of the sports. The purpose of inducting youngsters in the team is to prepare an experienced squad, for the next World Cup. Babar Azam and Yasir Shah are the youngsters who emerged as to performers during the Zimbabwe series and they have bright future ahead. I am very hopeful that we will get more such promising and talented youngsters who will make their presence feel at international level through their extraordinary performances,” he added.
“Sri Lanka will play without its two key players Mahela Jayawardena and Kumar Sangakkara which will prove beneficial for us but yet we will not be lenient against them. It will be a wrong approach to take our opponents for granted in absence of two important players,” the head coach said.
To a query regarding his visits to Australia time and again, Waqar said: “Pakistan is my motherland, therefore, I am here. My family is in Australia so I have to go to see them as well. It is part of my contract with the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) so I need no permission from anyone to go to Australia.”
About international cricket revival in Pakistan, Waqar said: “The cricket returns in the country is very good not only for our players but also for the entire country especially for the cricket crazy fans, who were anxious to see their heroes live in action at their home grounds. It will flourish Pakistan cricket and help us in getting young and promising talent.”
Waqar expressed pleasure over the revival of international cricket in Pakistan and said: “The international cricket return to Pakistan has been a real big morale booster for the players to finally play at home and the team will take that confidence going into the series against Sri Lanka.”
Pakistan team has to play three Tests, five one-day internationals and two Twenty20s on its 53-day tour of Sri Lanka. It will open the Sri Lanka tour with a three-day warm-up match in Colombo from June 11 before the first Test starts in Galle on June 17.