LAHORE: Mohammad Yousuf wants to instill the spirit of the 90s into the upcoming generation of Pakistani cricketers and the former skipper is aiming to do so in his role as the national U-19 side’s head coach.

The junior side departed for South Africa on Friday to participate in the U-19 World Cup, which is set to be held from Jan. 19-Feb. 11.

“We need aggression, the kind of aggression we had in the 90s,” Yousuf said in the pre-departure press conference here at the Gaddafi Stadium on Thursday.

“I don’t want the players to go overboard and use offensive language in any way but I do think we have to shun friendliness on the pitch in order to be more competitive.”

Pakistan would need every bit of aggression as they head into the event at the back of a shocking defeat at the hands of United Arab Emirates in the U-19 Asia Cup semi-final last month.

““We committed lot of mistakes in that match and despite that we lost by only 11 runs,” said Yousuf. “These are young players who are eager to learn and improve their performance.

“They are learning and putting in a lot of effort however they shouldn’t have lost against UAE, I think there were several miscalculations on their part.”

For Yousuf, the UAE nightmare wasn’t enough to write off Pakistan as favourites to win the World Cup — their campaign starting against Afghanistan on Jan. 20.

“The boys have put in lot of effort and it shows,” he said. “They delivered a good performance in U-19 Asia Cup and rest assured they will perform even better in upcoming matches and bring the World Cup home.”

Published in Dawn, January 6th, 2024