Abu Dhabi (Agencies): New Zealand won the toss and decided to bat first against Pakistan in the first one-day international (ODI) at Abu Dhabi on Wednesday.
Pakistan defeated New Zealand 3-0 in the preceding Twenty20 series on Sunday.
“It’s important to break that losing streak and we need to bring improvement in our performance in one-day internationals,” said Sarfraz on Tuesday.
Pakistan lost the last two matches in a 3-2 series defeat in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in 2014, before losing 2-0 in 2015, 2-0 in 2016 and 5-0 in January 2018 — all in New Zealand.
“If you look at our losses most of them were in New Zealand where conditions were different and we lost due to top order failure where we need to improve,” said Sarfraz.
The last two matches are in Abu Dhabi (Friday) and in Dubai (Sunday).
Teams
Pakistan: Fakhar Zaman, Imam ul-Haq, Babar Azam, Mohammad Hafeez, Shoaib Malik, Sarfraz Ahmed (c), Shadab Khan, Imad Wasim, Hasan Ali, Shaheen Afridi, Junaid Khan
New Zealand: George Worker, Colin Munro, Kane Williamson (c), Ross Taylor, Tom Latham, Henry Nicholls, Colin de Grandhomme, Tim Southee, Ish Sodhi, Lockie Ferguson, Trent Boult
