ISLAMABAD – Pakistan team is in clear and present danger of getting knockedout of the race for last four.
With just three points from five matches, Pakistan will now need to win alltheir remaining four World Cup games to stay in the hunt for a place in thesemi-finals.
It seems a near impossible task for a team that has failed to really clickin the tournament apart from the game against England.
Meanwhile New Zealand requires only two wins to equalise points tally withPakistan.
However during the Indian match the senior trio of Shoaib Malik (0),Mohammad Hafeez (9) and captain Sarfraz Ahmed (12) could contribute just 19runs towards the team’s cause as Pakistan. Fakhar (62 from 75 balls) andBabar (48 from 57 balls) were the only Pakistani batsmen who managed toresist the Indian onslaught but even the duo never really took on theattack that was without frontline pacer Bhuvneshwar Kumar, who had to walkout of the filed after bowling 2.4 overs because of a hamstring injury.
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For Pakistan even the gentle medium pace of Vijay Shankar (2-22) was toohot to handle. But it was spinner Kuldeep Yadav who did the most damage ashe scalped both Fakhar and Babar to finish with figures of 2-32. HardikPandya took 2-40, cleaning up the senior duo of Hafeez and Malik.
Pakistan can’t say they weren’t warned. Hours before the start of themarquee clash, Prime Minister Imran Khan had advised Sarfraz Ahmed to batfirst if the flip of the coin goes in Pakistan’s favour.
