Last Updated on 4 years by Charbel Coorey

Why did Pakistan lose 3-0 to an understrength England? | Reasons why Pakistan lost the ODI series 3-0 to an understrength England

A full-strength Pakistan team were incredibly whitewashed 3-0 by England’s second-string side in the recently-concluded three-match ODI series.

3-0 was always on the cards, but the team who achieved it was somewhat of a surprise. Many were expecting this scoreline to be in favour of Pakistan and not the other way around, particularly with an inexperienced England squad which had only James Vince and Ben Stokes with more than 10 ODIs to their name.

Before the series, England announced an overhauled 16-member squad for the series after COVID-19 cases in its original squad forced the players into quarantine. A confident Pakistan team came into the series after winning their last six international bilateral series, including an ODI series win in South Africa. Against a completely new-look England team, Pakistan started as the favourites to win the series with their key players like Babar Azam, Hasan Ali and Mohammad Rizwan all in top form.

However, England’s nothing-to-lose approach and lack of fighting spirit from the Babar Azam-led Pakistan team resulted in a humiliation for the Asian Giants. In this article, we discover the points why Pakistan lost the series which they should’ve won.

Babar Azam’s mediocre form with the bat in the first two ODIs

If we take out his splendid innings from the third ODI at Edgbaston, Pakistan’s skipper didn’t really find his mojo with the bat in the series. He started the England limited-overs tour with a duck in the first ODI which was followed by another low score of 19 in the second. Babar got big runs in the final one-dayer but it was too late for Pakistan and even his career-best score couldn’t save Pakistan from a series whitewash. From Pakistan’s point of view, Babar should’ve set the tone of the series from the first game which he failed to do, and that translated on the performance of the other batters.

Openers failing to get big starts

Be it any form of the game, you need your openers to set the tone for the batsmen to follow. Two of Pakistan’s best ODI batsmen in Imam-ul-Haq and Fakhar Zaman failed to produce any substantial partnership at the top.

Losing early wickets minimises the team’s chances to put up a big total or chase down one. Fakhar came into this series off the back of two spectacular tons in South Africa but was undone by three different bowlers in the series, totalling just 63 runs in three innings. The same was the case with Fakhar’s opening partner, who scored just 57 runs in the three innings.

Imam did salvage things a bit with a half-century in the final ODI, but couldn’t get to the three-figure mark. Pakistan is a team that relies heavily on their top order as they still haven’t fixed their middle-order. Unfortunately for Pakistan, the top order didn’t produce enough.

Shaheen Shah Afridi’s off show with the ball

The tall lanky left-arm pacer had an ordinary series with the ball as the Englishmen milked runs off him in the powerplay and later. Shaheen’s ineffectiveness with the ball was the major worry for Pakistan as in the recent past he has been the wicket-taking option for the Asian Giants.

He gave away too many boundary balls and lacked control especially in the first powerplay where he’s been the most effective in the 50-over format. Before the start of the series, expectations were high from the young pacer because of his record with the white ball in the UK. Many cricket pundits believe that Shaheen was trying too hard to take wickets instead of sticking to the basics which resulted in his downfall in the series.

Shadab failed once again

There are growing concerns over Shadab’s role in the one-day team. Shadab had a poor series with bat and ball, picking up only three wickets and leaking runs at an economy rate of 5.6. It wasn’t much better with the bat, scoring just 51 runs at 17.0.

The 22-year old’s primary role is to take wickets in the middle phase of the game and contribute with runs. Sadly, it hasn’t been smooth sailing in either department. This has been the case with Pakistan’s budding all-rounder in the last few limited-overs series.

Written by Vaibhav Tripathi. Follow Vaibhav on Twitter today.