Flower criticises bowlers for poor show

WELLINGTON: Grant Flower, Pakistan’s batting coach, took a swipe at his bowlers for not using their brains after the tourists crashed to a 70-run defeat against New Zealand in their opening One-day International here on Monday.

In a frank post-mortem after loss, Flower said the visitors “didn’t use [their] brains” towards the end of New Zealand’s innings, in which 71 runs were plundered off the final five overs. Those runs had largely come from New Zealand’s No. 9 and 10 batsmen, Mithcell McClenaghan and Matt Henry, who put on 73 together, before No. 11 Trent Boult edged the final ball of the innings through the vacant slip region.

Pakistan had used the short ball well, to have New Zealand 99 for 6 by the 23rd over, but Flower said the death overs required a different approach.

“We didn’t use our brains at all towards the end,” he said. “Bowling yorkers is skill execution, and we didn’t do that. They played well at the end. The short ball worked to a certain extent, but we overdid it, and we didn’t learn and we just didn’t bowl enough yorkers.”