Pakistan to face England in first ODI today
The match will start at 4:00 pm (PKT) today.
ABU DHABI (Dunya News/Agencies) – The first match of the four-match one-day international series will be played at the at Sheikh Zayed Cricket stadium Abu Dhabi today (Wednesday). The match will start at 4:00pm (PST).
Pakistan, winning the three-match Test series 2-0, are seeking huge improvement in their one-day rankings to lift for the 2019 World Cup to be held in England.
Besides hosts England, seven other top-ranked sides as of September 30 2017, will qualify directly. The only way Pakistan can move up the order is by winning matches against higher-ranked sides.
Pakistan, sitting eighth compared to England s sixth, will hope they do not repeat their below-par performances in 2012 when they lost 4-0 in the UAE.
"We know the importance of this series and have to do well to build the side for the future, especially with the Champions Trophy 2017, rankings and the 2019 World Cup all in the mind," said coach Waqar Younis.
Leg-spinner Yasir Shah will hope to carry his Test form, taking 15 wickets in two matches, into one-dayers.
"One-day cricket has changed and now even a 300-plus total is not safe which England have adopted and are a dangerous side," said Waqar.
After being the only top side not to reach the World Cup quarter-finals, England beat finalists New Zealand 3-2 before losing 3-2 to Australia after the Ashes - both at home.
England media reported some players were training under a baseball expert Julian Wood to develop more hitting techniques.
"Julian has worked with us before, done a really good job," England s director of coaches Andy Flower was quoted as saying. "Part of our job is to offer options to players and they make decisions about whether they want to adopt things."
Pakistan (probable): 1 Azhar Ali (capt), 2 Ahmed Shehzad, 3 Mohammad Hafeez, 4 Younis Khan, 5 Shoaib Malik, 6 Bilal Asif/Mohammad Rizwan/Babar Azam, 7 Sarfraz Ahmed (wk), 8 Anwar Ali, 9 Wahab Riaz, 10 Yasir Shah, 11 Mohammad Irfan.
England (probable): 1 Jason Roy, 2 Alex Hales, 3 Joe Root, 4 Eoin Morgan (capt), 5 James Taylor, 6 Jos Buttler (wk), 7 Moeen Ali, 8 Chris Woakes, 9 Adil Rashid, 10 David Willey, 11 Reece Topley.
