Haris Sohail re-emerged at World Cup 2019

Lahore : After missing four games, he’s enjoying his new role at number five 89 against South Africa best World Cup innings by Pakistan’s middle order since 1992, Just like Pakistan, Haris Sohail has been reborn at the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2019.

Haris was a casualty of his side’s opening defeat to West Indies, left out of the side for the subsequent four games.

But the left-hander, deployed at number three in March’s series against Australia, has been recast as a fluent number five and spearheaded successive victories over South Africa and New Zealand.

“The way I was batting in the Australia series, I was in good form even then,” said Haris.

“I have a slightly different role for the World Cup, I’m batting at five, but wherever you bat the basics should be simple and based on the requirement of the situation.

“Whenever I’ve played before, I’ve never been out of the team because of my performances. I had a bad surgery and it was because of that I was struggling.

“Of course I felt a little bad when I was dropped, but I was thinking only about the team – it was for the betterment of the team.

“When we play for Pakistan, we have one aim: what is best for Pakistan. As such I haven’t changed anything, I’m playing according to the situation and thankfully succeeding.”

Sarfaraz Ahmed’s side, drawing eerie parallels with Imran Khan’s Cornered Tigers of 1992, will climb into the top four if they beat bottom side Afghanistan at Headingley on Saturday.

Haris’s vital 89 to down the Proteas was the best World Cup contribution from a Pakistani middle-order man since Javed Miandad’s identical score against Zimbabwe at the 1992 World Cup.

The 30-year-old also batted in an unexpectedly aggressive manner at Lord’s, his strike-rate against soaring to 150 – far dwarfing his career rate of 85.

The Punjab product can expect to face spin almost exclusively in the middle overs against Afghanistan and it’s clear Mickey Arthur has his side studying mystery man Mujeeb Ur Rahman.

“We have kept it very simple. We are taking the World Cup match-by-match,” said Haris.

“They have quality spinners and we have seen a lot of videos to try and work out their variations.

“We lost to Afghanistan in a warm-up – they played very good cricket that day. We hope to play better cricket and win.

“Every match has a different pressure and at a World Cup, there is always pressure. Hopefully we will see a good match against Afghanistan.”