The former Pakistan pacer Waqar Younis feels that the top order of the Pakistan side should have shown a little more intent and aggression in the first 10 overs of batting, which could have killed the game from the Indian point of view.
The shocking defeat against India for the ‘Men in Green’, where they failed to chase down a low score of 120 in their 20-overs at the Nassau County International Cricket Stadium has hampered the road of the remaining ICCMen’s T20 World Cup 2024, in the Wert Indies and the United States of America.
The team now needs to win both of their last games against Canada and Ireland, to ensure that they have a chance to qualify for the ‘Super Eight’ stage of the competition, while if they don’t, then they may need to be involved in the qualifiers for the next edition’s T20 World Cup in 2026.
‘It was an easy game to win…’ – Waqar Younis
The opening combo of captain Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan hasn’t worked again for the Pakistan side, while young Usman Khan wasn’t able to soak up the pressure in crunch moment. Fakhar Zaman started well with a six against Axar Patel, but couldn’t capitalize from that situation.
Even Iftikhar Ahmed struggled so much that he failed to nail the low full toss from Jasprit Bumrah who too was on his leg stumps. Imad Wasim suffered from pain and failed, as was the case with Shadab Khan.
The former pacer of the team, Younis Khan feels that the road for Pakistan competing will be quite ‘tricky and bumpy’ as they have only themselves to blame for not win such an easy game against India.
‘The road going forward is very tricky and very bumpy at this stage for Pakistan. They have themselves to blame. They can’t really blame anybody. The opportunity was there. It was an easy game to win,” Veteran pacer Waqar Younis reveled during a discussion on the ‘Star Sports.
The pacer opened up on the fact that the Babar Azam-led side should have scored more runs in the first 10 overs, which would have settled the nerves quite a bit.
‘There were 57/1 at the halfway stage. I thought maybe 10 runs short at the halfway mark. They should have been sitting somewhere close to 75 because you lost only one wicket and you were sitting at 57. You should have been a little bit more than that,” Former Pakistan coach Waqar Younis pointed out.
Even from 57/1 at the end of the 10th over, they needed 63-runs in 60 balls, and still had nine wickets in the bank, which should make the chase quite easy. But Pakistan kept on losing wickets at regular intervals and couldn’t handle the pressure at all.
The Punjab-born puts finger on the fact that the 2009-champions will now need to win their last two games by big margins, and still need to depend on the other teams to help them out for the qualification.
‘Pakistan have played poor cricket so far. From here on, Pakistan are once again relying on other teams to do well, and of course, winning the rest of their two games, and hoping that Ireland beat the USA and then India beat the USA,” Waqar Younis elaborated.
He shed light that the team always puts themselves in these situations, and they have plenty to think for the future.
‘There are a lot of ifs and buts now and it’s always been the case like this with Pakistan. Pakistan need to think hard and the cricket board also needs to think hard that why this is happening all the time. So, there are plenty of things to think about,” 52-year-old concluded.
At the same ground, the runners-up of the last edition will face Canada next on June 11.