Pak vs Ban 1st Test – Azhar Mahmood – Pakistan stunned by Rawalpindi pitch drying up quickly

On a slow track where the ball was always low, Bangladesh cruised through the opening sessions, and although wickets at regular intervals kept Pakistan’s hopes of a real big lead alive, an unbeaten sixth wicket of 98 runs for the visitors paid off. to that goal.

Mahmood revealed Pakistan’s belief in how the strip would play had a major impact on the decision to go with the pace combination.

“The reason why we didn’t play the spinner was that there was grass on the field and we thought it would favor the seamers,” said Mahmood. “We were hoping for that. But the three hours the pitch was listened to before the start of the match on the first day might have made the difference. The wicket dried up; we didn’t think it would dry out so quickly, and that made it a different game.”

Pakistan brought in Australian keeper Tony Hemmings earlier this season to work in the fields. At first glance, this wicket had a lot of grass on it before the start of the Test, leading the Pakistanis to believe that it would offer more pace and bounce. But this Test, which saw 15 wickets in three days despite Bangladesh’s batsmen being statistically suspect against high pace, followed the same pattern in the two.

“There is nothing we can do about the truth [the pitch] They didn’t behave that way. They didn’t make a mistake in reading the pitch, they didn’t play the way we thought they should.”

Azhar Mahmood

“The combination we made required a pitch with pace and bounce, and for that wicket to play as we expected,” said Mahmood. “But that didn’t happen. If the wicket has pace and bounce or sharp spin, there are more chances for the batsmen to make mistakes. If the pitch is slow, the batsmen have more time.

“If you look at our team selection, you can see that we didn’t want a flat wicket. We wanted a good one that supports everyone, fast bowlers and spinners and produce a pitch that makes people want to sing. We will try to make sure the second one has seam and bounce and pace on it.

“Tony is here with us, and he is waiting for something about what he wants to produce the field he wants. We will get him what he needs, but he has a short time to come in and prepare this field. Moving forward, we.” I will ask him to prepare the type suitable for our planning, he has great experience, he has worked all over the world and he knows what he is doing.”

However, Mahmood admitted that the surface was not the only factor that made Bangladesh finish the day at 316 for 5 runs, 132 to hang on to Pakistan’s first innings effort. The sixth-wicket partnership between Litton Das and Mushfiqur Rahim, each unbeaten in centuries, recovered a batting pace that had been sluggish for three quarters of the day. Bangladesh scored 87 runs in the last 14 overs – 12 of them with the new ball – and the batsmen were all too eager to punish short runs in a pitch where the ball was not tempted to rise above chest height. Litton dropped Naseem in a memorable over, hitting him for three fours and a six in the dying stages of the day to underline Bangladesh’s late dominance.

Mahmood admitted that Pakistan’s bowling quality had declined by that point. “We didn’t behave enough in the last 12 overs,” he said. “If you look at the whole day, we were good in the 80 overs. With the second new ball we deviated from the plan. Then they attacked. It allowed them to play that kind of cricket. But you can also get runs easily off the ball, and they used that well.”

In the end, however, a little surprise from the bamboozling expectations was a lingering stress on the mind of Pakistan’s assistant coach.

“Anyone looking at the wicket would have thought it was a seaming track. There’s nothing we can do about the fact that it didn’t behave that way. It didn’t make a mistake in reading the pitch, it didn’t play. like we thought it should.”