Difficult to improve ranking without home series: Misbah
"I think the system is fair and objective. It takes into consideration home and away matches."
The Pakistan captain, who engineered a 3-0 test whitewash of England earlier this year, dismissed suggestions that England did not deserve their number one test status.
He backed the world's top-ranked side to bounce back in Sri Lanka because of the strength of their bowlers.
After losing all three tests to Pakistan in the UAE, Andrew Strauss and his men were also humbled by Sri Lanka in their opening test last week and need a quick reaction for the second test starting in Colombo on Tuesday.
"They became the number one test side after playing well not only at home but in Australia and other countries. But they are in danger of losing their number one ranking if they don't comeback in Sri Lanka," Misbah said.
"England has a top class bowling attack and when you have quality bowlers at your disposal you can always make a strong comeback in any conditions," Misbah told Reuters in an interview.
"The pitches in Dubai when we played them were more difficult for batting. The pitches are better in Sri Lanka so England can come back. They lost to Sri Lanka in one session. They need to focus on the test session by session. When we played them it was a session-to-session battle for us because we knew they were a dangerous side and their bowlers were very good."
England's main downfall has been their batsmen's inability to play spin effectively.
"They are competent against spinners in England but they struggle due to the different conditions they find in the subcontinent or recently in UAE," Misbah added.
"The reason is that their batsmen play in the Asian region only after long gaps."
COMMENTS (8)
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com on guys i read some rubbish commnts about Misbah dont talk blindly check the stats he is top class performer not only in test one day also. Cricket is a team game and u need diffrnt style of batsman and every one have thier duties like Afridi his duty is to accelerate run rate Misbah,s duty is to keep one end safe if u are honest just check who is successful in his duties Misbah R afridi,umar,younas.... i think its clear ans that only misbah is regular performer /////// then why u guys pointing finger to successful person Y u r not saying anything to the people which r completely flop..... pls b honest not jealus
@Pak 1: Chewing balls and chewing gum is a art you dont know nor your Misbha test player............... aFRIDI Rocks and he is a real star stadium is full just becoz him people watch cricket just to see his hard hitting...................;
@Shariq: He can be a test captain than why he wasting time in ONE DAY and T20 he is a just a borring captain with a defensive speech learn from Mahender singh Dhoni to accept mistakes dont blames on other first give some good run in less balls in one day instead of test like attitude.Comoon Misbha is you like your team winning than you have to step out let Shoibmalik,imran nazir,Abdul razak come in the side before they expire like Mibha
@Ali: He doesn't need to improve his ranking. He already has an average of over 100 as captain and Pakistan has only lost only one Test under his captaincy.
Misbah's performance, as a batsman, in Tests is pretty good actually.
@Ali: Well when you are busy winning cups and not chewing on balls it is tough to improve personal rankings.
Pakistan and India should play a Test series in England.
It is very difficult for Misbah himself to improve his own ranking anyway.