Follow UsAhead of their Asia Cup 2025 opener against Oman on September 12 (Friday), Pakistan’s head coach Mike Hesson had huge praise for his spin bowling unit. In particular, the former RCB head coach singled out Mohammad Nawaz as the best spinner in world cricket at the moment.
Over the last month, Nawaz’s career has sprung back into the limelight, with a five-fer against Afghanistan on September 7, which included a hat-trick. The left-arm spinner has picked up 20 wickets in 2025, averaging just 10.90.
"I guess the beauty of our side is we've got five spinners. We've got Mohammed Nawaz, who's the best spin bowler in the world at the moment, and he's been ranked that way over the last six months since he's come back in the side,’ Hesson told the press ahead of Pakistan’s first Asia Cup 2025 clash.
“And obviously we've had Abrar [Ahmed] and Sufiyan [Muqeem] do as well as he has. Saim Ayub is now in the top ten all-rounders in the world. So obviously that comes on the back of his improved performance with the ball. And Salman Ali Agha has hardly bowled, and he's obviously the test spinner for Pakistan" he added.
However, there’s a lot of concern over Pakistan’s batting, which lacks experience after the management decided to do away with both Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan. Hesson carefully put the batting line-up as a ‘developing one’, reckoning that there’s a lot of room for improvement.
"It's very much a developing batting line up. And there's a number of players who, on their day, can win you the game, but they don't have as many good days as you'd like at the moment. I think that's very fair. The thing for us, though, is we're more interested in the sum of the parts as a batting group. Because there are times where 150 is good enough, there are times where 190 might not be. So you've got to, as a batting unit, decide what's required to win the game and see if we can get above that," he said.
Given Pakistan face India on September 14, Hesson insisted that the team is looking forward to the challenge. Across their last two H2H meetings, across formats, Pakistan didn’t have the best of games against India, succumbing to two embarrassing defeats.
"We know that India are obviously hugely confident, and rightfully so, in terms of how well they've played. We're very much focused on improving as a team, sort of day by day, and not getting too far ahead of ourselves, but we're well aware of the... I wouldn't say the enormity of the task, I'd say the challenge of the task ahead, and we're certainly looking forward to it," he said.