India Pakistan CWC 2019 Match: Lessons Learned !

Pakistan PM Imran Khan wrote a long and passionate message on Twitter to motivate Pakistan team. He exhorted them to try and give their best in the India-Pakistan match and fight till the last ball. He categorically asked Sarfaraz Ahmed to bat first if he won the toss.

Sarfaraz Ahmed won the toss. He promptly chose to bowl. He was yawning widely while keeping and fell asleep while batting as the asking run rate crashed through the roof. Forget the last ball, Pakistan were out of the game after Amir finished his 4th over.

Even with Duckworth Lewis looming large, they were never in the hunt after the 20th over while batting and each over widened the gulf between DL target and Pakistan score. And then it was all over in the 35th over. There was no fight left.

A disinterested looking India went through the motions when play resumed for those farcical 5 overs with Pakistan needing over 25 runs every over. Even if Dhoni, Kohli, Rahul, Rohit and some Indian fan from the crowd had bowled those 5 overs, India still would have won handsomely. It was a total non-contest, quite like the crowd; India all the way.

So what are the lessons learned for Pakistan ?

1. Sarfraz Ahmed doesn't care for CWC history
2. Damn, Imran Khan's message was in English

The World of Cricket World Cups - Part 4 - 1992

The 5th edition of the World Cup was hosted by Australia and New Zealand, officially known as ‘Benson & Hedges World Cup’. It was a ‘first’ in many respects:

• Coloured clothing and day-night matches in floodlights with white balls and black sight-screens.
• The format of the tournament was ‘round-robin’, which meant that each team would play the rest 8 teams once and the top four teams would proceed to semi-final stage.
• The World Cup was being held in the Southern Hemisphere for the first time
• There was also a logo commemorating the World Cup for the first time.

The teams were the same from previous edition, with the addition of South Africa, making it 9 teams in total. South Africa was included as a full member nation for the first time, after ending their ban of 22 years due to ‘apartheid’ – a system of institutionalised racial segmentation in South Africa which oppressed the Black, coloured and Asian South Africans.

India started off poorly, losing the opening  match against England, game against Sri Lanka getting

washed out and losing to Australia (incidentally again by the margin of 1 run, as in World Cup 1987). Indian team returned to winning ways in the high voltage match against arch-rivals Pakistan. This was the first time these 2 teams were meeting at a World Cup and the match had its moments of skill and emotions on the field. The most noteworthy effort was of a young Sachin Tendulkar, scoring 54 not out and then taking the crucial wicket of Aamer Sohail, who was playing well and looking set to take Pakistan across India’s total of 216. Sachin was adjudged ‘Man of the Match’ for the 5th time in his career. Little did anyone know at the time that he would go on to win the award for a record 62 times in ODIs! The match is also remembered for the Javed Miandad - Kiran More verbal spat, which resulted in Javed hilariously jumping up and down, visibly irritated by the constant enthusiastic appealing by Kiran More. This match started India’s domination and winning streak over Pakistan in the World Cups, which continues till date. It can only be guessed how India managed to upstage Pakistan in these pressure matches in World Cups, especially during 90’s, when the Pakistan team used to dominate the Indian team comprehensively.

India continued its winning habit by defeating Zimbabwe in next game but crashed out of the contention of a semi final berth by losing its remaining matches to West Indies, New Zealand and South Africa. India finally finished at 7th spot, only above Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe.

Pakistan, on the other hand, had exactly opposite journey. After 5 matches, they were almost out of the tournament with just one win and a match washed out against England (which they would have mostly lost being bowled out for a paltry  score of 74). West Indies had already defeated them by 10 wickets in their first match chasing 221. Pakistan had just lost 2 wickets in 50 overs and still just scored 220 and their bowlers didn’t take a single wicket. The situation was completely hopeless. That is when Imran Khan stepped up in his role of leading from the front and motivated his team. He came out for the toss wearing a t-shirt sporting a tiger and gave his now famous ‘cornered tigers’ speech. His motivation bore fruits and Pakistan won their last three matches, including defeating the undefeated New Zealand. Pakistan were helped when Australia defeated West Indies in the last match before knock-out stages, which made Pakistan finish at number four and make a place in semi-final.

My Greatest World Cup XI

The World Cup fever is now finally getting on. While we wait for the real thing to start on February the 14th, its time to reminisce about the World Cups gone by. And here is me indulging in some typical fanboy hobby of picking a Fantasy XI. Following is my selection of the Greatest XI from the ICC Cricket World Cups. 

The selections have been made on the following criterion.

• World Cup performances - multiple World Cups count more.