Pakistan encouraged to be more 'ruthless' ahead of England Tests

Twice in the recent Test series against Bangladesh at home, Pakistan found themselves in dominant positions before conceding the advantage to the opposition.

In the first Test, they racked up a total of 448/6 before declaring the innings, only to concede a lead to Bangladesh that proved to be decisive in the final result.

In the second Test, they had the visitors at 26/6 in the first innings, but let them off the hook, allowing Bangladesh to make 262 and reduce the first-innings deficit.

Talking about not being "ruthless" enough in situations when they were dominating the opposition, head coach Jason Gillespie said that the scoreline in the series (Bangladesh winning 2-0) wasn't truly reflective of how the series panned out.

"We showed glimpses of quality in the Test series against Bangladesh, where we were really driving the game forward," Gillespie said on a podcast by PCB.

"We played some excellent cricket, both with the bat and the ball. The issue was that we didn't sustain it long enough. When we allowed our opponents to get into the game, they capitalised and pulled ahead. That's where we let ourselves down."

The Australian felt that Pakistan let themselves down in an hour or two during the Test and it really pegged them back.

"What we need is a bit more ruthlessness. When we're ahead, we need to stay ahead and make sure we really drive home that advantage. That's the main takeaway from the Bangladesh series.

"There was some very good work done, but when we had a bad hour, it really set us back. We need to minimise those poor periods and maximize the good ones."

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Pakistan have not won a home Test match since February 2021 and are desperate for a series win to pull themselves back up in the ICC World Test Championship standings.

They face England next in another home series early next month and will be hoping to turn the tide around from 2022, when they lost the home series 3-0 to England.

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"It's very clear how England approaches their cricket," Gillespie said. "I don't particularly like the term "Bazball," but they do play aggressive cricket. We've seen them evolve their game and that's how they want to play.

"We will play our way, striving to be a consistent and disciplined team that hangs in there and strikes at the right moment to drive the game forward and exploit gaps. That's our strategy."

The first Test will be played in Multan from October 7.