April 15 Monday 2002
Friday's defeat haunts Latif as Pakistan prepare for crunch NZ game

SHARJAH: Pakistan's wicketkeeper Rashid Latif got an unexpected boost on Sunday when his team mates made a collective visit to his room and urged him to forget his Friday nightmare in Sharjah and look ahead to the last match against New Zealand in this tournament.

Rashid after his 11 runs from 23 balls was down in the dumps since Friday night and decided to also skip the practice session which the Pakistan team had this morning at the Sharjah Stadium .

But after the players returned to the team hotel they went to Rashid's room and asked him to cheer up and forget about what had happened on Friday night against Sri Lanka.

"Rashid was very quiet and upset with his performance and blamed himself for the defeat and was not talking much to anyone. We went to his room to tell him he should not lose focus because of one bad performance and that we were all behind him and supported him," said one player.

Rashid struggled to score freely in the tight finish after he was sent ahead of Abdul Razzaq in the batting order and the Pakistani supporters at the stadium were clearly unhappy with his effort. So much so that even back home, Pakistan television in its national news made a statement that if Razzaq had been sent ahead of Rashid, Pakistan could have won the match.

Captain Waqar Younis and manager Yawar Saeed also had a separate word with Rashid and reminded him of his past performances in crisis situations for the team," the player disclosed.

For Pakistan, the match on Monday against New Zealand is now a do-or-die battle and it would require a combined effort from everyone to reach the final. This was the message repeated again and again in a team meeting this afternoon in which every player participated and viewed the recording of the match against Sri Lanka.

Yawar said on Sunday that everyone was now focussed on the task ahead and hopefully the same mistakes would not be committed again.

"There are no excuses for our defeat. You don't win matches if you have six dot balls in the last three overs. But what is done is done and now we have our work cut out for us," he added.

He made it clear that there would be no changes in the team as no risks could be taken.

Asked if there was any possibility of the opening combination being shuffled, he said the team had only two openers in Shahid Afridi and Imran Nazir and they would be persisted with.

Reminded of the Pakistan Cricket Board policy to give Wasim Akram rest in some matches so as to not put on his fitness under stress, Yawar said this was a policy which could not be followed in this tournament.

"We lost the first match and we had to field our best side. If we had qualified for the final by now we would have given Wasim a rest because that is ideally what we want to do. But these are conditions in which we need our best players," said the Pakistan manager.

He made it clear that in Monday's match against New Zealand, lot of care would be taken to see that if the ball needs to be changed in the last 15 overs, a prompt request would be made to the umpires.

Interestingly, on Saturday in the team hotel lobby, English umpire David Shephard was asked by the former President of the Pakistan Cricket Board, Justice (retd) Nasim Hasan Shah as to why the ball had not been changed in the match against Sri Lanka, when the batsmen were finding it difficult to sight it properly.

And the experienced umpire reminded Nasim Hasan Shah that no batsman had made any complaint to him about the condition of the ball and since the umpires found nothing wrong with it the ball was not changed as happens normally in matches at the Sharjah in the last 15 overs.

Before the start of the tournament, in the meeting of the team captains, managers with the umpires and match referee, a request was made by one of the captains that the ballchange should be made mandatory after 35 overs because of the heavy dew conditions, but the umpires made it clear this could not be done as the ball may also have to be changed in the earlier overs.

The umpires made it clear that if the batsmen or fielding side found the condition of the ball unfit, then they could draw the attention of the umpires to this and a decision would be taken on the spot.