KARACHI: Former skipper Rashid Latif beleived that Pakistan has got the golden opportunity to beat depleted West Indies team in their second pool "B" match of Cricket World Cup being staged at Christchurch on Saturday.
"If Pakistan cannot beat the weakened team from the Caribbean Islands, Pakistan don't deserved to be playing in the World Cup," he told APP in an interview here on Thursday.
He said West Indians are without their top four players including star batsmen including Bravo, Pollard and spinner Narine and Badree.
"Absence of these ace players has created a grand opportunity to for Pakistan to salvage their pride by beating Jason Holder's team," he commented.
"It would be disastrous if they failed to beat West Indies keeping in view their weakness against leg-spinners," he maintained.
However, he said for achieving their objective, Misbah-ul-Haq team's batsmen like Younis Khan and Ahmed Shahzad play big innings.
"Pakistan batting must click with at least one big century and a couple of big scores," he said.
He said like always Pakistan batting against India in World Cup disappointing and poor shot selection and hitting in the air cost them dearly.
Rashid Latif said the only spotlight in the defeat against India was superb bowling by Sohail Khan.
"Our bowlers must produce wicket-taking balls. You cannot restrict or contain West Indies batting," he remarked.
He said role of Shahid Afridi and Yasir Shah could be important if they bowled with guile.
He said though West Indies got the batting firepower with batsmen like Gayle, Samuels, Lendl, Sammy and company.
"But if our bowlers bowled in the right areas at the right time and come up wicket-taking delivery they got the chance," he stressed.
"Smart thinking will be required while bowling against these batsmen," he said.
"Pakistan must put 300 plus score if they bat first. That can put West Indies under pressure," he concluded.
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