June 05, 2017
BIRMINGHAM: Pakistan's head coach Mickey Arthur has expressed frustration over team's failure to execute plan in the ICC Champions Trophy match against India on Sunday.
Talking to media after Pakistan's 124 runs defeat, Arthur took the blame for selecting Wahab Riaz over Junaid Khan in the crunch encounter.
"The boys didn't go out there to perform like that. The boys have trained extremely hard. They've worked extremely hard over 12 days," Mickey said.
"It's up to me and my coaching staff to find out why we didn't execute. Why were we so tentative? That's more the issues for me at the moment. So, it's disappointing, but we'll go back to the drawing boards and we'll hopefully come back a lot stronger," the coach said.
Mickey Arthur also rued over missing opportunities to restrict India to a lower score comparing to 319 it scored in 49 overs.
"That's our own fault because we had two opportunities. Hasan Ali dropped Yuvraj and Fahim Ashraf dropped Virat Kohli. You take those catches, it's a different game," he said.
Mickey Arthur brushed aside the talks that Wahab wasn't fully fit for the game saying that the fast bowler had a role to play, but he performed poorly.
"I'll take the blame, me, I'll take it. I selected him. I selected him because I wanted him to perform a role. Okay? He didn't execute that role, unfortunately. So sometimes it works out. Sometimes it doesn't." added Arthur.
The coach added that Pakistan will find out the areas where it failed today and bounce back against South Africa.
"We'll have a good, hard chat tonight. And then when we leave the dressing room tonight it will all be done, and we'll be thinking firmly of coming back and beating South Africa. Because that's what I think our players can do, and that's why I certainly believe our team can do," he said.
Mickey added that the performance was a reality check for Pakistan of where it stand in one day cricket but refuse to blame the players for not putting enough efforts.
"The guys tried as hard as they could. My issue is fear. My issue is getting out there and really looking to take the game on and just believing in themselves and believing that they can take the game on," he said.
"The worrying thing for me, and it has been for a period of time, is we just do the basics wrong. We do the simple things wrong. We dropped simple catches. We don't run well enough between wickets," the head coach of the team added.
