ISLAMABAD - Former Pakistan finest wicketkeeper Rashid Latif has said that most of the cricketing nations are not playing normal cricket instead using cheats to register victories.

Talking to The Nation, Rashid said: “Now, no international team has been playing normal cricket these days, as Sri Lankans are depending on under-prepared pitches against Australia while India have advantage of skilful action of Ashwin, and no one can point finger on his action because an illegal bowling action clause is in favour of his action. Underprepared pitches, illegal bowling action, reverse swing, DRS, fancy fixing or match fixing, fitness and coaching and drugs all were heavily involved in international cricket in different time frames.”

He said Pakistan team was involved in all given examples in different eras. In 1992, British press labelled Pakistani bowlers as ball-tampers at the Lord’s and Oval Test matches but in 2005 Ashes series, England outplayed Australia due to reverse swing. After that, English press gave new name of ball-tampering that is art of reverse swing. Pakistan did well in England in 1983, 1987, 1992, 1996 and 2001 with reverse swing and leg break gugly and Saqlain Mushtaq off spin plus doosra was phenomenal.

“After 2000, most countries believed in coaching and training and they all improved but Pakistani teams didn’t adopt those things properly. For coaching point of view, we try to coach naturally talented players, but the standard of coaching in Pakistan was not of high quality,” he added.

About the third Test, Rashid said: “First time, Pakistan batsmen struggled on reverse swing at Edgbaston Test and lost badly on the last day. Pakistan team was playing comfortably at 69-1 but after the lunch break, they decided to go for a draw and both batsmen started doing tuk tuk. This was the turning point of the match. Cook realised the situation and attacked through Moeen Ali, who, along with other bowlers, bowled brilliantly and outclassed all Pakistani batsmen.”

He questioned why 17 players, 12 officials and four local officials travelling with the touring party plus families. He pointed out that foreign coaches had no clue of reverse swing or they couldn’t guide the players how to play reverse swing? Unfortunately, Pakistan batsmen kept on struggling on both methods of bowling – conventional and reverse swing – which means Pakistan coaching staff was not up to the mark.

Rashid said English coaches went to drawing board and sorted out their problems. “Interestingly, we didn't apply out weapon i.e. reverse swing and gugly, in the first Test as with leg break, mostly English batsmen throw out their wickets, but Yasir Shah’s straight deliveries and conventional fast bowling of Rahat, Aamir and Wahab Riaz, we couldn’t get benefit. In this series, no use of reverse swing and gugly plus leg spin bowling harm the team’s cause of winning the series.

“Yasir was badly exposed as English batsmen were playing him on front foot and killing his straight deliveries. It seems Yasir doesn’t have skills of gugly and sharp leg break bowling despite the team has a leg spin bowling coach. Sami Aslam batted sensibly and remained instrumental in both the innings of the third Test while Sohail Khan also bowled well,” he added.

Rashid said due to certain players’ group within the team, the real talent was not allowed to excel at higher level. “If the selection committee ignores all the talented players for ODIs and Test matches, how can we find good players? The selection committee selected two spin all-rounders for Ireland and England ODIs. I think we need one pace all-rounder like Amir Yameen, as there is no depth in batting. England has top-performing all-rounders in two out of three Test matches but we don’t have a single one. Pakistan is practically playing each match with 30-run handicap,” Rashid concluded.