COLOMBO, Sri Lanka - Canada's John Davison, the oldest player at the Cricket World Cup, has started doubting his ability to cope with the slow subcontinental wickets after being dismissed without scoring in both his side's Group A matches.
"I'm 40 years old and probably have those self-doubts that 'do I still have the ability to perform at this level?"' said Davison, who was born in B.C. but makes his home in Australia.
Canada plays Pakistan on Thursday after being crushed by Sri Lanka by 210 runs and Zimbabwe swept to victory by 175.
Sri Lanka fast bowler Thisara Perera clean-bowled Davison, while Zimbabwe's left-arm spinner Ray Price opened the bowling against Canada and got the better of Davison in his first over.
"I got a good ball against Sri Lanka, I'll give hats off to the bowler there," Davison said. "But against Zimbabwe I had a game plan and I wanted to hit Price over mid-off early but probably could've given myself a few more balls to get in."
Davison scored the second-fastest World Cup century -- off 67 balls -- against the West Indies in 2003. But he might move down the batting order on Thursday in a bid to regain some form.
"There is talk about me shuffling down the order, so I'll bat wherever they tell me," he said.
Batsmen have let down Canada badly with scores of only 122 and 123 in their previous two matches, but Davison said his team was capable of scoring 230-250.
"If we can get those kind of numbers up this time we can leave with our heads held high," he said. "At the moment everyone is pretty down and their performances haven't been great."
Pakistan beat Canada by eight wickets in the only one-day international between the two countries, when they met at Headingley, England in the 1979 World Cup.
Although Ireland upset Pakistan in the 2007 World Cup, leading to an early exit for the 1992 world champion, Davison believes the opposition will need a particularly bad day for his side to cause another World Cup shock on Thursday.
"We have to have our best day and they have to have their worst day," he said. "Hopefully Pakistan have a poor day which they have done in the past on many occasions."
Thursday will be a special moment for Canada's Pakistan-born players: all-rounder Rizwan Cheema and fast bowler Khurram Chohan.
Davison said the pair are "shy guys" when it comes to sharing information about the Pakistan team.
"It takes a lot of prodding to get a lot of info out of them," he said. "Maybe if we sit down with them tonight and we prod them they might be able to give us some more information."
The North Americans could well be playing in their last World Cup after the International Cricket Council decided to cut the number of teams to 10 from 14 for the 2015 tournament.
"All that is out of our hands," Davison said. "Personally, I don't really listen to it a lot.
"We're just here to play cricket, go out there and keep things simple, bowl a ball and hit the ball."
