Quantcast

Pakistan's Shah in doubt for third ODI

Pakistan could be without star spinner as they seek a 2-1 series lead over England

Pakistan are looking for the right combination to win the third one-day international against England in Sharjah on Tuesday, with skipper Azhar Ali admitting his team need to improve.

Seeking a sixth bowler in the limited-over series, Pakistan have not been able to include opener Ahmed Shehzad in the first two matches, with the scoreline reading 1-1.

Pakistan won the first encounter by six wickets while England fought back to level the series with a 95-run win, with both matches played in Abu Dhabi.

The hosts might be forced to leave out legspinner Yasir Shah as they seek the advantage in the four-match series, with the spinner nursing a knee injury.

He will be assessed before the match.

Azhar said Pakistan suffered multiple problems and were forced to use 11 different opening combinations in the past 12 months.

"Ideally, we want to have a set opening pair but, unfortunately, in the last one year or so, we had a lot of injuries plus we had some problems with our allrounders as well," Azhar said on Monday.

"(Mohammad) Hafeez is not allowed to bowl," Azhar said of the spinning allrounder, who has banned from bowling for 12 months over an illegal action.

"Then we have (the hand) injury to Imad Wasim.

"These things create problems in picking the right combination and, if there is a weak link in bowling, then you can struggle to control the flow of runs and I think that can damage the combination of the team and you have to sacrifice a player to have a better combination." 

Azhar said Yasir, who took 15 wickets in Pakistan's preceding 2-0 Test series win but managed 1-108 in two one-day matches, had bowled well in the first game of the series.

"You bank on spinners in this part but there was less support for the spinners in Abu Dhabi. 

"The other thing is that sometimes the other team also handles spinners well so there is no issue on their abilities."

Azhar said Pakistan were better than its No.8 one-day ranking suggested.

"We are a better team than our rankings suggest but, for now, we are focused on this series and we will take it series by series and, in future, like to improve our rankings as well." 

If Shah is ruled out, Pakistan could bring in uncapped left-arm spinner Zafar Gohar, who is also a useful batsman.