Babar Azam breaks silence as Afghanistan stun Pakistan in Cricket World Cup 2023. Clearly agitated Babar Azam, the captain of Pakistan, acknowledged that “we are hurt” following his team’s shocking eight-wicket loss to Afghanistan on Monday at the World Cup, ending any chance of reaching the semi-finals.
With one over remaining, Afghanistan defeated Pakistan for the first time in eight attempts in a one-day match by chasing down a 283-run target. In order to lay a solid foundation and put on 130 for the first wicket, Rahmanullah Gurbaz and fellow opener Ibrahim Zadran each made a brilliant 87 in 113 balls.
Against a sloppy Pakistan team, Rahmat Shah’s unbeaten 84-ball 77 and captain Hashmatullah Shahidi’s 48 not out sealed the victory.
“We are hurt as a team,” said Azam whose side now have three defeats and two wins in five matches.
They face a formidable South Africa at the same Chennai venue on Friday.
“We must feel the disappointment and my message to my team for the remaining matches will be to learn from this defeat,” said Azam, whose 74 off 95 balls aided by opener Abdullah Shafique’s 58 guided Pakistan to 282-7 after they won the toss and batted.
“We achieved what we set out to do when we batted but we were not up to the mark in bowling and fielding,” said Azam whose bowlers conceded 17 boundaries in the first 16 overs.
“We failed to put them under pressure but I congratulate Afghanistan for this victory.”
Afghanistan, who played four specialist spinners on Monday, also now have two wins in five matches.
“Afghanistan’s spinners are of good quality so the plan was to not give them wickets until the 40th over and then charge in the last ten but we fell some 10-15 runs short,” said Azam.
With 3-49 on his World Cup debut, 18-year-old Noor Ahmad led all Afghan spinners, while more seasoned slow bowlers Rashid Khan and Mujeeb Ur Rahman went wicketless.
Despite their shocking loss on Monday, Azam insisted Pakistan can still advance to the semifinals.
“From now on we need to play our best cricket in all departments and must overcome our mistakes.”
As Babar Azam breaks silence as Afghanistan stun Pakistan in Cricket World Cup 2023, Azam acknowledged that the team is struggling without fast bowler Naseem Shah, who was forced to withdraw from the World Cup due to a shoulder injury.
“Of course, Naseem is missed badly because he had been part of our scheme but overall our bowling has not clicked,” said Azam.
“We knew there are no margin for error on these grounds and we failed to execute plans.”
He added: “We have been perfect in training but I think our bowlers over-tried in matches and have leaked runs. We need to focus on positives and adopt a different mind-set.”
