Pakistan said before this series that they would be banking on its pace bowling in the ODI series to do the damage against Sri Lanka. The pace/seam bowlers on the whole have been a mixed bag with Gul and Rao bowling well (The latter is having a poor 3rd odi however) and AktharTanvir been disappointing.

Pakistan said before this series that they would be banking on its pace bowling in the ODI series to do the damage against Sri Lanka. The pace/seam bowlers on the whole have been a mixed bag with Gul and Rao bowling well (The latter is having a poor 3rd odi however) and AktharTanvir been disappointing.
 

However, the real problem seems to be the lack of potency with the spinners. When we are playing a bangladesh, Zimbabwe, kenya, Hong Kong etc.. The likes of Malik, Afridi pick up wickets for fun but against the Main sides in world cricket and both are found wanting. Its all fine bowling with decent economy both players should be used to take wickets in middle overs as the impotency with both pretty much means batsmen easily settle in middle overs of ODIs even if they arent scoring at rocket speed! Pakistan have pretty much depended on the Malik/afridi to act as the spin attack in ODIs.

Since 2007 up until 2nd odi of this series:-

All oppostion

Afridi - 37 Mat (36 inns) 50 wkts 32.06 ave 4.69 econ 40.9 S/R
Malik - 44 Mat (33 inns) 25 wkts 41.88 ave 5.00 econ 50.2 S/R

Exluding Minnows

Afridi - 25 Mat (25 inns) 25 wkts 45.92 ave 4.92 econ 56.0 S/R
Malik - 29 Mat (20 inns) 9 wkts 68.11 ave 5.62 econ 72.6 S/R

Exclude stats against minnows and pakistan usually 20 over contribution from its two all-round spinners its providing approximatley a combined effort of 1 for 115!!

In this ODI series currenly going Afridi/malik have bowled

1st ODI - 16 overs 2 wkts 68 runs
2nd ODI - 18 over 0 wkts 93 runs
3rd ODI - 17 overs 0 wkts 103 runs

So a combined effort of 2 wkts (1 each) for 264 runs!

Its pathetic to say the least!! One player is the skipper and the other is seen as the premier ODI spinner in the side!