Cricket World Cup 2019 team-by-team guide: Pakistan star men, strengths and weaknesses

Opening pair Imam-ul-Haq and Fakhar Zaman will be crucial to Pakistan's chances
Getty Images

In a series of articles, Standard Sport takes a look at the ten teams bidding for glory at the 2019 Cricket World Cup. Next up, it's the 2017 Champions Trophy winners, Pakistan.

World Ranking: 6
World Cup best performance: Winners (1992)
Captain: Sarfaraz Ahmed
Coach: Mickey Arthur

Since the last World Cup they’ve...

Won a global 50-over tournament, on English soil. Dress rehearsals don’t go much better than Pakistan’s ICC Champions Trophy campaign of two years ago, where they knocked out the hosts in the semi-final before beating the old enemy, India, in the final at the Oval.

Since then, however, things have not gone to plan. They may have whitewashed Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka, but in the last two years Pakistan have played four bilateral series against higher ranking sides and lost all four, by an aggregate score of 17-2. They arrive at this tournament on a run of ten successive ODI defeats.

Cricket World Cup 2019: Venue guide

1/11

Strength

The batting looks in good nick. If there is a silver lining to be taken from the 4-0 thumping at the hands of England, it’s that Pakistan scored 340 or more in three of their four completed innings, the same number as they’d managed in the previous 84 ODIs.

The top order, comprising of Fakhar Zaman, Imam-ul-Haq and Babar Azam, is among the best in the tournament, and all three scored hundreds in that series.

Weakness

It goes without saying that if you’re scoring that many runs and not winning any matches, something’s up. Pakistan’s bowlers did not exactly sparkle against England - which is why they have gambled on Mohammad Amir and Wahab Riaz, neither of whom bowled a ball in that series, as part of three changes to their provisional 15-man squad.

The bowling mediocrity, however, was nothing compared to the abomination in the field, where there were a plethora of embarrassing misfields that turned singles into boundaries and simple dropped catches galore.

Key man – Babar Azam

Azam celebrates his hundred against England at Trent Bridge in May 
AP

The only member of the Pakistani side currently ranked inside the top ten ODI batsmen in the world, Azam arrives in excellent form with his last eight innings in all formats reading: 80, 115, 15, 51, 16, 65, 101 and 68*.

Pakistan’s top order is crucial to their success, but, despite some excellent scores, both of the opening pair have still looked vulnerable against the new ball, falling for single figures on five occasions between them in the series against England. Azam, coming in at number three, plays a key role in steadying the ship.

The expert’s verdict – Will Macpherson, cricket correspondent

“Professionally mercurial, they came from nowhere to win the Champions Trophy, but this tournament looks a little long – with consistency rewarded – for them to thrive in but you never know.

“Their batting looks strong, and they have a strange, varied group of bowlers who will run through a couple of teams.”

Final 15-man squad

Sarfaraz Ahmed (c, wk), Babar Azam (vc), Asif Ali, Fakhar Zaman, Haris Sohail, Imam-ul-Haq, Mohammad Hafeez, Shadab Khan, Shoaib Malik, Imad Wasim, Hasan Ali, Mohammad Amir, Mohammad Hasnain, Shaheen Afridi, Wahab Riaz.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in