Colombo: Skipper Salman Ali Agha Saturday defended the unorthodox action of Usman Tariq and and termed the ‘pause and sling’ off-spinner as the “trump card” of Pakistan against India on a tacky Premadasa pitch in the T20 World Cup match Sunday.
Tariq showed his prowess with a three-wicket haul against the United States of America, albeit at the neighbouring Sinhalese Sports Club, and the 27-year-old could be doubly dangerous on a slower RPICS track.
“Usman is one among our 15 players, we treat him like that. You (media) people have made him big. He has been bowling very well,” Agha initially tried to downplay the hype around Tariq in the pre-match press meet Saturday.
But as the questions persisted on Tariq, Agha admitted that the off-spinner is indeed his side’s primary weapon against the arch-rivals, whose batting line-up is filled with power-hitters.
“He has been bowling very well for the past few months. And he has also bowled very well in the league cricket (Pakistan Super League) he was playing before playing for Pakistan. And yes, you can say that he is a trump card for us,” Agha added.
Questions have been raised about the unusual pause-and-deliver action of Tariq, but Agha did not read too much into those comments.
“He doesn’t care about these things. Since the time he has started cricket, these talks have been going on about him. He doesn’t care about these things. The guy has been cleared twice and he has done whatever ICC said and whatever it requires to bowl in international cricket.
“So I don’t know why people are saying so many things about him, but the one thing I can assure you is that he doesn’t care about that. He is smart enough and mature enough to deal with all this,” he noted.
But Agha said Pakistan attack has more to it than just Tariq.
“The spinner may dominate here, but I think the fast bowler will have roles here as well. Because fast bowling is such a skill that you cannot write off anywhere.”
The skipper thinks that Shaheen Shah Afridi will play a huge role due to the variations in his repertoire.
“His (Shaheen Shah Afridi) role is always there. So I think he will have a role here as well. We have a lot of spinners, but we also have fast bowlers, who we can use if required,” he said.
Agha acknowledged that Pakistan do not have a great record against India in the ICC events, but the top-order batter refused to dwell on the past events.
“Obviously, We don’t have a good record against them in World Cups. But whenever you come to play a new match, it’s a new day, a new match. And you have to play good cricket to win. So you can’t change history. You can learn from it. We learned from it. And we’ll try to do a good performance tomorrow and win the match,” he said.
Agha said the boycott saga initiated by the Pakistan government in solidarity with Bangladesh after the latter was ousted from the T20 World Cup was a thing of the past.
For him, the team was prepared for the big match Sunday.
“This is a game whose magnitude has always been massive and will continue to do so. And even tomorrow, the game is going to be massive. We were prepared for everything; We were prepared whether we play or not. We were prepared for everything when we came here.”
The 32-year-old said they are not worried about any particular Indian player as his side is prepared to tackle anything that the opposition comes up with.
“We have not targeted a few people. We have to play against the 11 players and we have plans against all of them. It is routine work. Our bowling coach works with the fast bowler. It is basically death bowling work. I think we have been doing it for the last 6-7 months. It was not just for this specific game. We do it in every practice,” he added.
