In a must win game for visitors (Pakistan) after they were trailing by 2-0 in series things have completely gone wrong for them from their absurd captaincy to clueless bowling choices by captain himself and unfortunately hosts England who’s playing without the regular players have made the record chase in the third game of the ODI series.
After complete average performances in first two games of ODI series the visitors arrived with the plan and captain Babar Azam has smashed his career best score of 158 runs to guide his team to massive score of 331 runs in their allotted 50 overs. Pakistan is always known for his top notch bowling from the decades as the quality of bowling is always the factor makes him the force to reckon with in this cricketing world. But surprisingly not to be surprised as still Pakistan has lost this match and unable to defend and save the series. One of the greatest bowler of his times Shoaib Akhtar has believed this is not acceptable from the Pakistan team to play such spirit of cricket.
“Your fan following will decrease (after such performances). If kids aren’t following you, you won’t get an inspiring star to play for you, you won’t get a new Shoaib Akhtar, Afridi, or Wasim Akram… if you keep thinking like the average person, it will only result in average decisions and average performances. Pakistan cricket is in a very serious situation, in treacherous waters, I’ll be honest with you. It’s a very hopeless situation, in the PCB, the management and the team.”
Further adding to his context Akhtar said,
“I am not saying this because I need a job. I am saying this because I am hurt, because I played this game for my country and I made sure that I run in and people get the value for their money but unfortunately that isn’t happening anymore. This is not defendable, not acceptable. This needs to be looked into. And somehow people in high authorities are turning a blind eye because they themselves are average people.”
The former Pakistan Spinner Danish Kaneria has completely lost his temper and straightforwardly dissected the bowling of current Pakistan team and said it was not England A team of Eoin Morgan otherwise not just they thrashed Pakistan after scoring over 400 and also restricted our in experience team to the lowest score.
"Shaheen Shah Afridi. Gh**te ka ace bowler (ace bowler, my foot!). You should be ashamed of yourself the way Vince, Gregory and Salt have thrashed you. You need to improve your behaviour first. You have hardly had any time since starting to play for Pakistan and want to be a star. When you don't respect your senior this is what happens."
“When Sarfaraz came onto the field after Rizwan was injured, he was trying to raise Pakistan’s spirits and was trying to fire them up and fight. But Shaheen’s reaction towards Sarfaraz was so wrong that it was visible on TV. Show your attitude towards batsmen and not senior players. You will never be successful in cricket unless you respect your seniors.”
Even the former Pakistan captain Ramiz Raja has come into the debate of Pakistan loss and said there is no need to be surprised about it,
“A B-grade team whitewashed Pakistan. I am not surprised with the result. Pakistan were mentally disintegrated after losing the first ODI. They could never recover from the shock. Headlines all over the world said that Pakistan lost to an England side assembled in two days due to the COVID-19 crisis.”
“Before the second match, there was pressure on Pakistan as a loss would have cost them the series. And they made plenty of mistakes. This has become a trend in Pakistan cricket. They do not learn from mistakes. Instead, when the pressure is on, they double their mistakes. And so they handed over the series.”
“Coming into the final ODI, they were again under pressure, knowing a whitewash was looming. And so, despite Pakistan scoring 331, England chased down the target with ease. When you are mentally down, nobody in the world can help you unless you are able to help yourself. In such a situation, even a simple situation looks difficult. This is exactly what Pakistan showed in the final ODI. The fielding was rubbish. Catches were dropped, there were misfields and missed run outs.”
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