LONDON: Pakistan won the toss and chose to bat against Bangladesh in their Cricket World Cup match at Lord’s on Friday, needing a record win to reach the semi-finals.
The current record is held by New Zealand, who beat Ireland in 2008 by 290 runs but Pakistan, fifth in the 10-team group, must win by more than 300 runs.
Pakistan were unchanged from the team that beat Afghanistan at Headingley last week while Bangladesh made two changes, bringing in Mahmudullah for Sabbir Rahman and Mehidy Hasan for Rubel Hossain.
“We will bat first, said Pakistan captain Sarfaraz Ahmed.
“We will do our best to get quick runs on the board. Our target is to score big runs.”
“We will do our level best to win this game and finish on a high note,” he added.
Bangladesh captain Mashrafe Mortaza said he would also have chosen to bat in sunny conditions.
“We would 100 percent like to have batted but we have to bowl well and restrict them to a total we can chase,” he said.
“We have been playing very well against them but they are starting to take off so it’s not going to be easy. It’s going to be my last World Cup match and I would love to win with this team.”
Squad:
Bangladesh
Mashrafe Mortaza (captain), Tamim Iqbal, Soumya Sarkar, Shakib Al Hasan, Mushfiqur Rahim (wkt), Liton Das, Mahmudullah, Mosaddek Hossain, Mohammad Saifuddin, Mehidy Hasan, Mustafizur Rahman
Pakistan
Sarfaraz Ahmed (captain), Fakhar Zaman, Imam-ul-Haq, Babar Azam, Haris Sohail, Mohammad Hafeez, Imad Wasim, Shadab Khan, Wahab Riaz, Mohammad Amir, Shaheen Shah Afridi
(Agencies)
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