Dougie Brown, the UAE coach, was left ruing “stupid” mistakes after his side were comfortably beaten by the United States in the first of three 50-over matches in Dubai. Aaron Jones hit a fine unbeaten 81 as the USA eased to a five-wicket win at the ICC Academy in Dubai, chasing the 210 required in 47.3 overs. The home team had claimed the official section of the series of matches between the two sides, when they <a href="https://www.thenational.ae/sport/cricket/rohan-mustafa-glad-to-be-back-in-the-old-routine-as-uae-seal-t20-series-win-against-usa-1.837710">won the Twenty20 international</a> on the same field on Friday. The series of three 50-overs matches now are essentially practice matches, with both sides eyeing more important challenges to follow. The USA will head to Namibia next month for the World Cricket League Division Two, while the UAE are pencilled in to play a one-day series in Zimbabwe, which remains subject to confirmation. Despite the low-key feel to the fixture, the manner of the UAE’s defeat was alarming. Rameez Shahzad made 53 and Rohan Mustafa 47, but the hosts faltered against the off-spin of Steven Taylor. They eventually managed 209 before being bowled out with more than an over still to face. The tourists chased their target with relative ease, thanks to half-centuries for Jones and Xavier Marshall. The national team’s form has been indifferent of late, having lost two series to Nepal on their previous assignment, and Brown is demanding a response. “You can’t win every game and you are going to make mistakes, but they key is we learn from the mistakes,” Brown said. “What I am seeing at the minute is we are making similar mistakes more than once. “You can make a mistake once. If you make it twice you are silly. If you make it more than twice, it is just stupid. “I’m not saying we have stupid people. I’m saying we need to learn a bit quicker than we currently are doing.” The two sides face different opposition before they meet again. The USA play Lancashire on Tuesday, while UAE have a 50-over match against the English county champions Surrey on Wednesday. “As disappointing as it is to lose, it isn’t the end of the world,” Brown said. “We have two more games, and we have to win the next two. That is what we are setting out to do. We weren’t quite there today, and we know there are certain areas we need to improve. “We were a bit ill disciplined. Three guys played well to a point. Rohan played well, Rameez to get 50, and [Ghulam] Shabber as well, but we lost them just when we needed them to kick on. “We identified that 230 would be a good score. We were in a perfect position in the last 10 overs to get 230 comfortably. If we had batted anything like [well enough] we would have got more than that. “That would have been a difficult chase on that wicket. We gave ourselves a chance, but realistically we had to get wickets on that pitch. “We bowled well, they found it hard to score, but with wickets in hand, with a decent over, they could break the back of the game.”
