Underdogs Pakistan face tough challenge

In the Sunday Telegraph, Wisden editor Scyld Berry cheers on Pakistan who he fears will be thrashed in the Tests against England and Australia over the next two months. He says that despite their potent bowling attack, they will struggle due to the lack of a settled pair of openers, the absence of a senior batsman in the middle order and the short time to switch from Twenty20 to Tests.

... it will be surprising if such a disorganised team is not hammered in the next two months by countries with all the necessary infrastructure to hand. And the impact of such a hammering could be even more far-reaching.

What pleasure will the new generation of Pakistani cricketers – real talents like Aamer and the cavalier batsman Umar Akmal, officially 20 – find in Test cricket, if it means nothing more than a flogging thousands of miles from home? Pakistan zindabad! Underdogs, come on!

Forget about Australia's one-day form, Pakistan will provide a better measure of Ricky Ponting's team in the neutral Tests ahead of the Ashes, writes Steve James in the Sunday Telegraph.

All we can really conclude from the recent one-day series is that these Australians are like walnuts: seriously tough to crack. ... Now [in the Tests against Pakistan] we can gauge more prudently whether, say, Ricky Ponting and Michael Clarke do have genuine problems against the short ball, because one-day cricket's endless demand for scoring can blur both judgments and perceptions. Did the West Indian Kemar Roach really inflict lasting psychological damage upon Ponting in Perth last winter? Mohammad Aamer, Mohammad Asif and Umar Gul may provide the answer.