Pakistan head coach Grant Bradburn accused lack of experience in India as one of the reasons behind their forgettable campaign in the ongoing ICC World Cup 2023. With four back-to-back defeats, Pakistan are all but out of the semi-final race for the third consecutive time in the tournament.
Ahead of their match against Bangladesh at Eden Gardens in Kolkata on Tuesday, Bradburn highlighted that Pakistan players are unfamiliar with all the venues hosting the marquee event due to the hiatus in the bilateral series against India since 2012-13.
"We are in a position that we didn't want to be. We are determined at this stage of the tournament to be in control of our destiny but we're not. That hurts the group," PTI quoted Pakistani as saying.
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"This tournament is on foreign conditions for us. None of our players have played here before. Every venue is a new one, including this one. We've done our homework meticulously on our opposition, on our venues that we're playing at, and we're prepared very, very well for each and every encounter. But the reality is that each and every venue is a new one for us and we don't feel disadvantaged at all in terms of the knowledge, the quality, the skill, the backing that we have for this team of cricketers," he added.
Bradburn, who was handed a two-year deal in May this year, said Pakistan were late to prepare for the quadrennial event and adapt to a dynamic playing style.
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"Ideally, preparation for a tournament like this starts four years ahead. We started six months ago and changed direction in the way that we want to play the game of cricket, especially the one-day brand," he said.
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"We've shown some positive signs of that over the last six months. We're proud of some of the performances that we've put on. It's taking a little bit longer than we hoped, but we want to play a dynamic brand that matches the challenge of the conditions we're playing in," Bradburn added.
Bradburn refused to blame the controversial DRS call for Pakistan's one-wicket loss to South Africa and said his side fell short by 20-30 runs despite assessing the sluggish Chennai conditions well.
"Chennai was a difficult venue to assess conditions, as you all well know. We felt we assess the conditions well but in the South African game we acknowledge and we've had skills meeting this morning and part of our skills meeting is that we reflect on the good and bad.
"And part of the admission for us is that we didn't have our batsmen going quite deep enough in that innings, and we probably left 20 to 30 runs out in the middle. And certainly 310 to 315, I think, in that game would have been sufficient to bring that game to a W for Pakistan," he said.
He said there was never any issue in terms of team environment.
"The environment is great. There's never any issue in terms of the environment. We have a wonderful group of players who are very determined, to bring joy to their nation, play a quality, exciting brand of cricket for our fans," he signed off.
(With PTI inputs)