We bowled badly, especially in the initial overs. And our batting just did not brace up to the target. After we lost the initiative in the first 15 overs, we could do precious little to salvage the situation.

This defeat should awaken us to the weaknesses that we showed on the field on Sunday. Luck favoured me with the coin again and it was a good toss to win.

The conditions were slightly heavy and our bowlers could have made full use of the early morning dampness of the wicket. But we failed to capitalise on it. Our bowlers kept on pitching the ball short, trying to use the seam. Having got off to a good start, it was difficult to stop the flow of runs. But all credit to our spinners for arresting the cascade ofruns. Joshi, Hrishikesh and debutante Sanjay Raul all stuck to their job.

The quick breakthroughs we achieved in the middle overs was perhaps the only satisfying aspect of the match. When I looked at the scoreboard after 15 overs and found that the Pakistan total was touching the nineties, I felt that we might have to chase a target of well over 260. Our spinners helped reduce the target substantially. I am really pleased with their performance.

I think we missed Saurav a lot today. He made intelligent use of the conditions while bowling on Saturday and his presence would have a difference. Saurav's batting would have been more crucial to us in the opening overs on Sunday. He is the man in form and has the ability to score boundaries off even good deliveries. We did not risk playing him as his presence will be very important for us if things come to a crunch over the weekend. I hope he recovers fast and comes back to the playing eleven on Wednesday.

While we missed Saurav, our openers did well to notlose a wicket in the first 15 overs. But they got shackled by the accurate Pakistani attack and scored runs far too less to the requirement of the team. I think we lost the match there. Scoring at a rate of over five through the next 35 overs was going to be a difficult task, more so since we were pitted against a strident attack. There might be some who would criticise the youngsters for throwing away the wickets. But they have my support. At that stage there was no other option but just to go after every ball. It's a matter of chance and we failed today.

With this defeat, the series has come alive and Wednesday's game would be a cracker. We have two off days ahead of us and we'll have to put our heads together to weed out the mistakes at the nets and in the mind. The defeat is now history and on hindsight I think this would help weed out complacency, if any, that might have creeped in and be on our toes.