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Mohammad Yousuf believes his 631 runs in this four Test series against England are of little use since the mammoth tally failed to save Pakistan from a defeat in the contest.

“It feels good to have scored so many runs but when I see that my team has lost this series, they seem so useless,” said the bearded Yousuf who has hit three centuries on this tour and is by far the leading scorer in the series.

Yousuf has already scored 1123 runs in 2006 and has overtaken the Indian skipper Rahul Dravid as the year’s top scorer.

The elegant batsman followed his 202 and 192 at Lord’s and Headingley respectively with a flamboyant 128 here at The Oval in the fourth Test against England which has put the tourists in a great position to win their first Test on this marathon tour.

“It was another good day for us and I would thank Allah for it,” said Yousuf a devout Muslim who believes his conversion to Islam last year has helped him become a better batsman.

Yousuf said that it was Pakistan’s bowlers who helped the team gain the upper hand in this Test and have brought it in a position to end the series at 1-2 after losing the previous two matches.

“It was a good toss to win and later the bowlers exploited the conditions in the best possible manner. We have batted well too so I am very hopeful we will win this match,” he hoped.

Yousuf agreed that he is currently in the best form of his life. “I’ve never batted the way I’ve been batting these days. It is all because of Allah. I do everything for the afterlife but if He is giving me rewards in this world as well then I am all the more thankful for his blessings,” he remarked.

Yousuf said that he would like to bat the whole day on Saturday to help Pakistan accumulate a lead of 300 to 350.

“Such a lead would make our chances of winning this Test very bright,” he expressed. He almost batted for more than half of the day before falling to Matthew Hoggard for 128.

Yousuf believes that Pakistan have done better at The Oval because of a change in their luck.

“We’ve mostly been unlucky in this series. We played well at Headingley too but luck didn’t favour us there. Here it did,” said Yousuf who was dropped twice by England earlier in his innings on Thursday.

Source:The News