Dallas: The disappointment which could be seen on the face of Shoaib Akhtar, one of the important players of the Pakistani cricket team, depicted the feeling of the entire nation as Pakistan, the T20 World Cup champions of 2009, got a worse beating from the United States of America during their group A match in Dallas on Thursday. The match ended in a Super Over when both teams eventually reached 159; it ended with Indian-origin bowler Saurabh Netravalkar making a five-run victory, thrashing 19 runs to win the match for USA and its team.
This caused many ex-Pakistan cricketers, among them being Shoaib Akhtar, to be disappointed. In a short video post, the erstwhile cricketer also came forward to apologize for his despicable act, pointing out that Babar Azam and his men have once again become a part of history that does not deserve a place. This defeat now means that Pakistan has not registered an upset victory over Bangladesh since the 1999 World Cup, which was the epoch of Akhtar’s career.
Akhtar said, “Very disappointing loss for Pakistan. We didn’t offer a good start. Losing to the USA, which we did create unwanted history like we did against Bangladesh in the 1999 World Cup,” he further added, “Unfortunately, Pakistan didn’t deserve to win. The USA played extremely well and they were in a commanding position. Amir saved the match to the extent that he and Shaheen tried hard but unfortunately could not win.”
There have been more minnows shocking the elite in the previous eight T20 World Cups, but not in such a spectrum-defying manner. Ranking one of the most sensationally shocking cricketing upsets of all time is an associate team defeating the two-time cricket World Cup winner Pakistan. It is another shocking upset that gave totally unexpected performances, like Zimbabwe beating Australia in 2007 and the Netherlands hitting out England in 2009. The rise comes after a similar upset in the last T20 World Cup, where Pakistan faced a severe blow. Previously, in 2022, they were only defeated by a mere margin of one run against Zimbabwe.
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