16 minutes agoAuthor: Ashwin Solanki
- copy link
What Pakistan feared happened. After America, India also defeated it in the group stage. Due to two consecutive defeats, Pakistan’s hopes of reaching the next round of T-20 World Cup are almost over. Now the team’s remaining hopes rest on Ireland and India. If any of these teams loses to America, then Babar Azam’s team will get the ticket to return home from the first round.
Why would it be surprising if Pakistan is out?
Because Pakistan is the team that has qualified for the knockout round maximum 6 times in the T20 World Cup. More than India, Australia, England and West Indies. Pakistan has played 3 finals since 2007. The team became champion in 2009, while being runner-up in 2007 and 2022. Pakistan has also won 2 ICC ODI tournaments.
How did Pakistan’s problems increase after losing to India?
Pakistan was defeated by America in the first match. The American team won the match in the super over. At the same time, India achieved a 6-run victory over Pakistan despite scoring 119 runs on the New York ground.
With Sunday’s result, India has reached first place in the points table of Group A and America has reached second place. Both have 4-4 points. Even after 2 matches, Pakistan has not scored any points, the team is at fourth position. Pakistan will now play its last 2 group matches against Canada and Ireland.
Ireland can also make a difference
Ireland had already defeated Pakistan by 5 wickets in T-20 last month. Ireland has also caused an upset by defeating Pakistan in the 2007 ODI World Cup. The team had also achieved the feat of defeating champion England in the group stage in the last T-20 World Cup.
Not only this, Ireland’s name is associated with defeating big teams. Along with England, the team also defeated top teams like West Indies, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe in the T-20 World Cup. On the other hand, Pakistan has lost to smaller teams like America and Zimbabwe in the last 2 World Cups. That means Pakistan team cannot take Ireland also lightly.
There will be no benefit even if we win against Canada
Pakistan’s next match will be against Canada on June 11 in New York. Even if Pakistan team wins this match, it will have to defeat Ireland to keep its hopes of Super-8 alive. Even after winning both these matches, Pakistan team can be eliminated. Even if America loses its last two matches, it will still have a chance to stay ahead of Pakistan on the basis of better net run rate.
This means that Pakistan will have to win its last two matches by a big margin and at the same time it will have to pray that America does not win any more matches from here.
America became the biggest problem for Pakistan
Only the top 2 teams of the points table from Group A will go to the next round. India have strengthened their claim for a spot by defeating Ireland and Pakistan. The team has 2 matches against Canada and America. India’s chances of winning both the matches are very high.
On the other hand, America has 2 matches left against India and Ireland. If America wins even one of these matches, then the team will score 6 points and eliminate Pakistan from the race.
Pakistan needs support of India-Ireland
If Pakistan wants to qualify even in this situation, then all its hopes are now pinned on India and Ireland. If both of them defeat America then only the team will be able to qualify with 4 points. Because if America loses both the matches, it will stop at 4 points. However, for this also Pakistan will have to keep its run rate better than America. America will face India on June 12 and Ireland on June 14.
Pakistan is in worse form than the last World Cup
Pakistan lost its form after losing the T20 World Cup final in 2022. After this the team played 28 matches, won only 9 and lost 17. During this period, 2 matches also remained inconclusive. That means the team’s winning percentage was only 32%. Just before the World Cup, Pakistan was also defeated by Ireland and England in 3 T-20s.
Why is Pakistan in such a bad condition?
In 2023, Pakistan played 11 T-20s and won only 4. Then in the ODI World Cup also the team was out of the group stage. After this, the team’s white ball captain Babar Azam left the captaincy. Shaheen Shah Afridi became the new captain, from here the bad condition of the team started.
Under Shaheen’s captaincy, Pakistan lost the 5-match T20 series in New Zealand 4-1. From here the criticism of Shaheen started, he could win only one match out of 10 for his team Lahore Qalandars in Pakistan Super League. Whereas Peshawar Zalmi, captained by Babar Azam, reached the playoffs.
After criticism and poor performance, Shaheen also left the captaincy of Pakistan. Babar was once again made the captain of the white ball team. However, the results did not change and Pakistan lost the T20 series to New Zealand at home. With this form, the team is now playing the World Cup and the team is almost out of the group stage.
,
Graphics: Mahesh Verma
