The lanky 7 foot, inch paceman suffered a fracture to his hip bone & was ruled out of the remaining World Cup matches, including mouth-watering quarter-final against the four-time champions at the Adelaide Oval.
ADELAIDE: Pakistan coach Waqar Younis described Mohammad Irfan as the team's X-factor but insisted they can still defeat Australia despite the giant seamer being ruled of the event with a stress fracture of his pelvis.
"It's a giant loss. They was an X factor for us but they have got to live with it."
"It's unfortunate that they lost Irfan at the wrong time," said Waqar on Wednesday.
"This injury could have happened a very long time before, so they cannot say that it happened days ago, it is not simple for us but they must cope with it," said Waqar.
Waqar refused to accept that Irfan had not been rested adequately.
"I am pleased with the performance of the quick bowlers " Wahab Riaz has taken responsibility & has been delivering & so has Rahat Ali.
"We have been approaching the games very well in the whole event. They had a poor start at the beginning but they came back well."
"The bowlers know what to do & they are doing well. Look at the bigger picture, look at what happened in the recent past, losing so lots of bowlers & some nice spinners for other reasons so it is hard but they are handling that well."
Pakistan's preparations for the World Cup were badly hit when their ace spinner Saeed Ajmal was suspended due to an illegal bowling action in September last year.
It got worse when spinning all-rounder Mohammad Hafeez was also banned for his action before they injured his calf while pacemen Junaid Khan had to be withdrawn from the 15-man squad a month before the beginning of the World Cup with a leg injury.
Waqar did not rule out playing leg-spinner Yasir Shah in lieu of Irfan on Friday.
"We have discussed Shah but they will look at the pitch & if it is conducive then they will see the way it goes," said Waqar, who added they was not worried about facing a hard opponent like Australia.
Shah took 12 wickets in Pakistan's 2-0 Check series win over Australia in the United Arab Emirates last year' their first win over the opponents for twenty years.
"Look, they are in a situation where they cannot worry much. They must go out & do the best they can. It is a large game, a quarter-final of the World Cup & all of us are over happy to be here."
"We know Australia play very aggressive cricket & they must match that."Waqar said Pakistan needed to be positive.
We can beat Australia but for that they must be very positive. They have beaten them historicallyin the past, even in the last World Cup (2011) so they can do that again if they play to our strengths.
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