England captain Andrew Strauss conceded that his team had been outplayed after their humiliating defeat cost them the series against Pakistan.
Strauss blamed the inability of his top-order batsmen to handle Pakistan’s bowling attack for the stunning loss.
“The top-order has to take that on the chin and make sure it doesn’t happen again,” he said. “Sometimes you need to spend a bit of time in the middle. There’s always a balance between attack and defence.”
Strauss also rued England’s incapability to force out a win after having played themselves into a comfortable position.
“We worked hard to get into a winning position but ultimately couldn’t take that opportunity. Good bowling from both ends made it hard from us. Each batsman has to look at his options individually. Some of our more attacking players got out early rather than getting through it.”
Despite the humbling loss, the England captain was confident of a fightback from his under-fire troops.
“There’s a lot of pride in the England side and we believe we’re better than we’ve shown in this series. We’ll take in what happened and then come back strongly in Dubai.”
Published in The Express Tribune, January 29th, 2012.
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Congratulations to both teams for giving us pleasure of watching test match at its best
Congratulations to both teams for giving us pleasure of watching test match at its best