Pakistan captain Salman Ali Agha defended Usman Tariq’s unconventional move on Saturday, calling the “pause and sling” off-spinner his team’s “trump card” against India in Sunday’s T20 World Cup encounter in Colombo on a tacky Premadasa surface.
Although it was at the nearby Sinhalese Sports Club, Tariq demonstrated his ability by taking three wickets against the United States of America, the 27-year-old may be much more dangerous on a slower RPICS pitch.
“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,” during Saturday’s pre-match press conference in Colombo, Agha first attempted to minimize the excitement around Tariq.
Agha acknowledged, however, that the off-spinner is his team’s main weapon against the fierce adversaries, whose batting lineup is full of powerful hitters, as the questions about Tariq continued.
“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.
Tariq’s odd pause-and-deliver action has drawn criticism, but Agha did not take those remarks too personally.
“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, he doesn’t care about that. He is smart enough and mature enough to deal with all this,” he noted.
Agha countered that there is more to the Pakistan attack than only Tariq.
“It is possible that the spinner dominates 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.”
Because of his repertoire’s diversity, Pakistan’s captain believes Shaheen Shah Afridi will play a significant role.
“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.
Although Agha admitted that Pakistan’s record against India in ICC events is not particularly strong, the top-order batsman chose not to focus on the past.
“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.
According to Agha, the boycott controversy that the Pakistani government started in support of Bangladesh after they were eliminated from the T20 World Cup is a thing of the past. According to him, the team was ready for Sunday’s crucial game.
“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 stated that his team is ready to take on any challenge the opposition presents, thus they are not concerned about any specific Indian player.
“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.
