Star Pakistan batter Saud Shakeel feels that Pakistan paid a heavy price for being under extra pressure to perform in their World Cup loss to India in their marquee clash of the ODI World Cup and also lamented the absence of the team’s devoted supporters from the match.
The Men in Green were outplayed on Saturday as a result of their inability to compete with the home team. Pakistan suffered a humiliating batting collapse against India on Saturday in Ahmedabad losing their final eight wickets for just 36 runs.
Speaking to AFP, Saud Shakeel feels that the batters were under tremendous pressure to do well against India and spoke about the lack of supporters for their team in the game and wants to overcome the failure for the last game to come good against five-time champions Australia on Friday.
“I think we were under extra pressure so we tried to get out of that and wanted to play shots, When you have your crowd then you get the support. We did not get that and it was not in our hands,” Saud Shakeel said.
“The mistakes we committed in the last game, we must overcome them. That match is gone. If we win against Australia then our position will get better,” Saud Shakeel added.
Team India continued their streak of defeating Pakistan in the ODI World Cup by handing Pakistan a heartbreaking seven-wicket loss in the game. It was Pakistan’s fifth consecutive defeat against India in the 50-over format of the game.
Australia Are Always Good In The World Cup – Saud Shakeel
Saud Shakeel believes that Australia are always a good side in ICC events and that Pakistan should rely on their strength to defeat the five-time champions. He also wants to move forward in the tournament taking game-by-game.
“Australia are always good in the World Cup. They are a very good side. We know our strong areas and we must play good cricket,” he added further.
“We had a good start to the tournament with two wins. We want to go match by match and not commit the mistakes we did against India,” Saud Shakeel concluded.
Pat Cummins and Australia’s 2023 ODI World Cup campaign got off to a rough start before the Sri Lanka game. After a significant victory over Sri Lanka, the five-time champions are eager to maintain their form moving ahead in the competition.
