A predictable result

Insanity has been described as doing the same thing over and over again, yet expecting different results. Someone should tell the Pakistani cricketers.

After dropping Ricky Ponting yesterday, the writing wasn't on the wall so much as it was on the scoreboard, or it should have been, even before it has technically "occurred". Because once Ponting had been put down on nought, in one of the worst dropped catches of all time, he was always going to score big. You couldn't change it any more than you could change what you had for breakfast a week last Thursday.

Pakistan coach Intikhab Alam lamented a cultural indifference to fielding in Pakistan, but unless that is turned around, this will inhibit the Pakistani side much more than any inability to play Test Matches on home soil. In short, "catches win matches" is a cliche not just because it rhymes, and the sooner Pakistani cricketers learn that, the better.

The defensive tactics shown on the fourth morning in Sydney that played a vital role in letting Australia bat to a position they could, and ultimately did, defend, were also revived as Pakistani captain Mohammed Yousuf decided the best way to play Australia was to stop Ponting and Michael Clarke score boundaries. Half an hour into the second morning they are both still at the crease, having scored a combined 260+ runs, with less than half coming from boundaries.

One would suggest that Pakistan would have to try something different, but they never do, so why should we expect them to now? They've always been a side that has seen cricket, and particularly Test Cricket, as a purely linear game. Pakistan has always solely relied on the batting and bowling talent of their players.

Unless you are the West Indies of the 1980s or the Australians of the early 2000s, you simply cannot consistently win Test Matches without some other method of gaining the advantage. You can either put a increased focus on fielding and catching, as the Australians did in the mid-1980s when their talents stocks were low (replicated by Zimbabwe in the 1990s and New Zealand in the early 2000s), or find a innovative thinker, make them captain, and try new things like opening the bowling with a spinner or setting attacking yet unorthodox fields. For this method think Martin Crowe at the 1992 World Cup.

However, Pakistan seem committed to mediocrity in much the same way George Pell is committed to Catholicism. They seem to want to win only one way, which is irresistable brilliance with bat and ball. Not only is this method unsustainable for long-term success, it's also incredibly lazy. They seem to have an aversion to working hard or thinking in an innovative fashion.

The fact that Australia has Pakistan on their calendar again in a few months augurs well for the confidence of the Australian Cricket Team leading into next year's Ashes series. That is, unless Pakistan do something different. Don't hold your breath.