Indian captain Rahul Dravid on Wednesday blamed the inability of his frontline batsmen to negotiate the new ball for the team's 341-run loss to Pakistan in the third cricket Test here.
India, set a record target target of 607, collapsed to 265 with one full day's play left to hand Pakistan the match and the series at the National Stadium here.
Dravid said that while his top order batsmen's failed in both the innings in seeing off the new ball, the opposition did well in their second innings and that made the difference between the victor and the vanquished.
"Credit to their batsmen. The key here was the new ball. And the difference was we lost five wickets in both the innings to new ball," Dravid said.
"We probably let us down ourselves. New ball was critical and we did not play it well. Yuvraj Singh's hundred in the second innings was not good enough.
"They played better cricket through the four days."
{{/usCountry}}"They played better cricket through the four days."
{{/usCountry}}Pakistan bounced back from being reduced to 39 for six on the first day through Kamran Akmal's century in the first innings and combined batting effort in the second when they scored 599 for 7 declared.
But Dravid said that it would be a different ball game altogether when the one-dayers would start.
"We have learned new things about ODIs in the last few months and that's the reason why we have done well in the two series against South Africa and Sri Lanka. But yes, we have to play well against Pakistan because they are very good one-day side, especially at home".