CWC2023 : Afghanistan humiliates Pakistan by 8 wkts in a brilliant chase

 

Pakistan's completes hat-trick of defeats in the World Cup.  After India, Australia they also lost to Afghanistan.   

 Afghanistan came to play after defeating the last world champion England in the previous match in a sensational result .  Pakistan is a less fancied  team compared to England.  Pakistan lost to India by 7 wickets and Australia by 62 runs.  Afghanistan won by  eight wickets against a demoralized Pakistan  team.  Even a tough target of 283 was chased down for the loss of only 2 wickets in style .  No one made a hundred.  But all four batsmen contributed for the team.

 Babar Azam's captaincy has been in question for a long time.  It wouldn't be surprising if that claim got even stronger after Monday's match.  Questions are being raised about Pakistan's fielding for a long time and  It has not changed so far.  At least three catches have been missed  by Pakistan fielders in this day's match.  Gurbaz, Zadran, Rahmat all got back to life once.  Apart from this, there are numerous fielding misses.  Hasan Ali , Haris , Shaheen  also bowled poorly 

 Besides, Babar is not able to use intelligence as a captain.  The pace department of the team is good.  But as Afghanistan slowly moved towards the target, Babar bowled one over after another with the spinners.  Afghanistan had no trouble playing spin  bowling.  They took short runs.  Babar's weakness in using the bowlers back and forth has also been detected.

Despite a good start against Afghanistan, Pakistan could not go far.  Openers Abdullah Shafique and Imam-ul-Haq put pressure on the Afghan bowlers from the start.  Pakistan's batsmen could not hit a single six in the first ten overs this year.   Shafique hit not one but two sixes today .  First Naveen dismissed Imam  Ul Haq for 17.  

 Imam's poor form continued.  Even in this match, he did not get big runs from his bat.  Pakistan captain Babar paired with Shafique.  After making a pair of 54 runs together, Shafique returned for 58.  Before that, he completed half a century.  On the shoulders of Babar and Mohammad Rizwan came the responsibility of preventing the collapse of Pakistan again.  But Rizwan failed to fulfill that duty today .  Babar kept one side going but Rizwan returned with 8 runs.

 No big runs from reliable batsman Saud Shakil (25).  However, Shadab Khan and Iftikhar Ahmed contributed in addition to Babar (74) behind Pakistan's modest score.  Shadab returned in place of Mohammad Nawaz in this match.  He played a crucial innings of 40 runs.  Iftikhar also scored a brisk  40.

Their opening pair of Afghanistan won against England.  That opening pair also won the match against Pakistan.  Rahmanullah Gurbaz, looked in dazzling touch.   He is completely different in the national jersey.  Like the previous match, he did not get a hundred on this day.  But the Pakistan bowlers were smashed by him .

  Be it Shaheen Afridi or Hasan Ali, the two openers had ruled early on.  Shaheen's bowling has still looked patchy in the World Cup.  His woes came out against Afghanistan as well.  Gurbaz returned with a belligerent 65 runs off 53 balls with the help of 9 fours and 1 six.  The team's runs reached 135.

  Rehmat Shah, who dropped to number three, was in no rush.  At a slower pace, the other opener set his sights on forming a partnership with Ibrahim Zadran.  Jadran also left the shell after Gurbaj returned.  Afghans  began to play aggressively, despite a slow start.  He was moving towards the century.  But had to return for 87 glorious runs that fetched him the man of the match award .  The team's run was 190.

  Afghanistan is a team that has lost in such situations in the past.  But Monday was not to be.  Pakistan's bowlers did not allow it.  There was no rhythm to their bowling.   The pacers were brought in later, but by that time the match was in Afghanistan's pocket.  Rahmat remained unbeaten on 77 runs.  Shahidi remained unbeaten on 48 runs. The Pakistani bowling attack looked like a rudderless ship with no one to take charge .