Michael Clarke believes his players have improved in Asian conditions since their horror tour of India last year, despite the scorecard in Dubai showing a 221-run victory for Pakistan. Clarke faces the prospect of becoming the first Australian captain since Mark Taylor in 1994 to lead his side to a series loss at the hands of Pakistan, unless the team can dramatically turn things around in Abu Dabi. He says "I'm obviously very disappointed with the result but really impressed with the way Steve Smith and Mitchell Johnson in particular showed a lot of grit today and fought their backside off," Clarke said. "That's part of the Australian way. We certainly weren't going to turn up here today and throw our wickets away. We were going to fight as long as we could and I thought those two played really well in tough conditions.