Relief was the overwhelming feeling amongst the Pakistan camp after their opening win at this ICC Cricket World Cup 2015. The victory over Zimbabwe was the tonic needed for Pakistan to revive their floundering World Cup, and they will look to continue drinking that tonic when they take on the UAE in Napier on Wednesday.
While the batsmen struggled once more against Zimbabwe, the bowlers stepped up just when it was required, with Mohammad Irfan and Wahab Riaz doing the star turns.
As good a win as that was, though, Pakistan will still be worried about their batting. If Misbah-ul-Haq had not held one end up against Zimbabwe, Pakistan might have been shot out for under a 100 instead of 235, and the skipper will hope for a much better contribution from his top order, especially the openers – Pakistan's best opening partnership at this CWC is 11 runs, which pretty much tells all of the story.
"We are looking forward to just giving them a lot of confidence," said Misbah about his batsmen. "And they are working hard in the nets. Let's see this pitch, they might be feeling a little bit more confident in playing here.
"These are the only things that you can just share with the guys and just give them confidence and just be positive all the time. It's a new innings, it's a new game."
While Pakistan were short-handed on the batting front with Rahat Ali coming in for Younis Khan, it did give the bowling lineup more potency, with Irfan, in particular, doing his business exemplarily well. Misbah said the team composition would be decided based on the wicket, although he did emphasise on the advantages of having five bowlers in the lineup.
"If you see that the pitch is more suitable to batting, you need to have five bowlers," added Misbah. "I haven't seen the pitch yet, but at least there is one thing that is working well in favour of us and we should stick to that strength, the bowling.
"Irfan has bowled really well. But in the first two games, the opposition knew they just had to see him off. They knew that after 10 or 15 overs, they wouldn't see him again until the Powerplay.
"But in the last game it was different. We had four frontline seamers and the opposition knew they had to score runs [against Irfan]. Now he knows he has the back-up bowlers, so he just went all out. That really helped."
While Zimbabwe seriously struggled to cope with Irfan and his excellent bowling, the UAE, coached by former Pakistan internationals Aaqib Javed and Mudassar Nazar, are not too worried about the paceman.
"Irfan played in Dubai seven years back," said Amjad Javed. "If you have faced a bowler in a domestic match in Dubai before, then it's okay. If you have not faced anyone, like Dale Steyn, that's a different matter.
"We are ready for Irfan and are not scared, Aaqib is helping us, batting coach (Mudassar Nazar) is helping us."
The Pakistan batting will fancy themselves more against the inexperienced UAE lineup, and it will be the batting that the Emirates team will also worry about, having collapsed against India at the WACA on Saturday.
Shaiman Anwar is the only one who has really stepped it up with the willow, and the right-hander alone cannot carry the load at this World Cup.
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Pakistan vs UAE is set to begin at 2 pm local time (6.30 am IST, 1 am GMT, 8 pm ET) with live coverage on the Star Sports in India. Viewers in India can catch the match via live streaming online on Starsports online and Starsports Live Pro.
Watch the match in Pakistan on PTV and Ten Sports, with the option to live stream on PTV Live and Ten Sports Live. Viewers in the UAE can do watch the match live on OSN Sports or OSN Play.
Catch the match live in the UK and Ireland on Sky Sports, with the option to live stream on Sky Go. Viewers in US can watch the game live on ESPN and ESPN Cricket. The match can be watched live in New Zealand on Sky TV while all the action can be live streamed online on Sky Go NZ. Australia viewers will be able to watch the match live on Channel 9 and Fox Sports with the live streaming option on Cricket Australia Live and Foxtel.
