'Successful' South Africa tour helped team prepare for World Cup: Pak U-19 coach

Karachi, Feb 14(ANI): Pakistan's cricket Under 19 coach Sabih Azhar has said the South African tour has been useful in preparing for the forthcoming World Cup in Australia.

"Overall it was a successful tour and it was an important tour in particular as preparation for the upcoming Under 19 World Cup in Australia. It was a good learning curve, as the conditions we faced here will be somewhat similar to what we can expect to see in Australia," PakPassion.net quoted Azhar, as saying.

"So it was good that the boys got some experience on these types of conditions. The boys have learnt well from this tour and going forward Inshallah it will prove helpful for the Under 19 World Cup," he added.

The World Cup tournament will contain the 10 ICC Full Member Nations and 6 teams.

This tournament has been the showcase of top international talent such as Inzamam-ul-Haq, Yuvraj Singh, Brian Lara, Ian Bell, Virat Kohli, Eoin Morgan, Graeme Smith and Hashim Amla.

On being asked how the team will prepare for the World Cup, Sabih said the upcoming tournament would help the team prepare for the tournament.

"Before the World Cup we will be involved with an Asian Cup in Malaysia. That should prove quite helpful in preparing the team. They are also setting up another camp, and trying to organise other tours. We may have Afghanistan and Bangladesh touring here in Pakistan too. These types of tours are always helpful," he said

"There are also plans in place for the team to travel early to Australia so that they can acclimatize themselves with the conditions. We are also hoping to go early to Australia and possibly play a one day series against Australia before the one day series. Inshallah we are hoping to develop a good and strong fighting team," he added. (ANI)