Nightmare avoided but Pakistan still needed wake-up call

Pakistan are probably one win away from securing a place in the World Cup quarter-finals but Shahid Afridi knows his men were given a timely wake-up call by Canada.

- Scorecard

In a tournament where most of the title challengers are posting 300-plus scores on the dead sub-continental pitches, Pakistan's batsmen spluttered along for 43 overs before being bowled out for 184 by some smart Canadian bowling.

At the half-way mark, Afridi admitted memories of their 2007 shock defeat by Ireland came flooding back -- but at the same time spurred his men to avoid defeat.

"I must say that was a poor batting performance and poor shot selection. I think if we want to play good cricket against good teams we should improve on this," Afridi said after Pakistan's 46-run win.

"It's a good wake-up call for us.

"The Pakistan game against Ireland in 2007 was definitely on my mind. When we started the second innings I just told my boys 'listen are going to play this game for a win. Don't think negative. We will definitely win this game. We will work hard'."

Thirteen days into the tournament, Pakistan top Group A with six points but their performance against a team made up of a 16-year-old school student and a bunch of part-time cricketers is hardly likely to strike fear into rivals such as three times champions Australia.

- World Cup coverage

Their coach Waqar Younis said his charges will have to do a lot of homework before they take on New Zealand on March 8.

"Half time it was a worry but we knew our strengths and we knew our bowling was good enough to defend this total," said Waqar, who did not want his men to suffer the same fate as England who were beaten by Ireland just 24 hours earlier.

"We saw last night the smaller teams, they have really stepped up, so today was a bit of a hiccup but I'm overall happy because a win is a win.

"I think we did a super job, especially Shahid Afridi with the ball. Batting has not been the best but we can work on that."

While the batting was a bit of a letdown, at least the bowlers more than made amends -- with Afridi leading from the front.

He now sits on top of the wicket-takers' leaderboard with 14 victims thanks to his five-wicket hauls against Kenya and Canada and four against co-hosts Sri Lanka.

While Afridi's batting has yet to catch fire, Waqar did not feel he had any reason to complain.

"I would love him to score a few more runs but he's our leading bowler. Not only is he a container but he's taken 14 wickets. So watch out.

"We didn't play to our potential. On this pitch, it was a bit swingy, because the cloud cover came at mid day and it started swinging a little bit. The discipline was certainly missing in the batting, we've got to talk it out and make sure we don't do it again."