Australian batter Steve Smith believes playing against Pakistan in their home conditions would be a terrific challenge, saying the Green-shirts have got a great squad and quality players.
“Pakistan has got a terrific squad, a lot of quality players all throughout their lineup. So playing against Pakistan in their home conditions is going to be a terrific challenge. We played against them a couple of years ago back home, so we saw quite a few of the players there and there seems to be a lot of terrific players coming through the Pakistan system.
They’re a great squad and we have to play really well over here if we’re going to beat them,” he said in a presser on Tuesday.
To a question on facing players like Babar Azam, Mohammad Rizwan, Shaheen Shah Afridi and Haris Rauf, he said they were high quality and world-class players. “It’s hard to tell yet, we’ve got to see the surface that we’re going to be playing on and play accordingly as that’s the best way to play away from home. We’re excited about the challenge.
“In terms of Shaheen Shah Afridi and Haris Rauf, I think they’re both terrific bowlers and are progressing really nicely in their careers. We look forward to coming up against good players so we’re excited.”
“This is our first away tour since the Ashes in 2019, but we’re excited again about playing some cricket away and challenging ourselves in foreign conditions. I performed really well in the last away tour and hopefully I can replicate something similar in this series. Hopefully a good preparation the next few days and then some big runs this series.”
To a question on the possibility of him bowling, he said we have got quite a few spinners on this tour.—APP
