Sunil Gavaskar takes slams Pak Skipper Babar Azam for his statement ‘India will be saying big thank you’
Sunil Gavaskar takes slams Pak Skipper Babar Azam for his statement ‘India will be saying big thank you’
Sunil Gavaskar slammed Pakistan Skipper Babar Azam after India’s Asia Cup 2023 opener against Pakistan which got washed out due to rain.
In a match that figured some of the biggest names in world cricket, there was just one name that was supreme – Afridi. pace spearhead of the Green Army. He bagged two prized scalps in the rain-marred contest on Saturday amidst the traditional rivals at the Asia Cup 2023.
Afridi first hoodwinked Indian skipper Rohit Sharma and thereafter outsmarted Virat Kohli, who had just brought out his signature cover drive to highlight his form in the previous over. The premier pacer of the two-time Asia Cup winners had silenced the Indian supporters at a packed Sri Lanka’s Pallekele International Cricket Stadium.
Even as Afridi bowled out the Indian top-order with his masterclass bowling legendary cricketer Sunil Gavaskar wasn’t convinced that Babar Azam’s Pakistan side played their cards right against rivals India at the continental tournament. While speaking about the blockbuster India-Pakistan face-off, Gavaskar opined that the bowling changes of Babar didn’t make any sense to him.
Im the midst of his chat with the media, he felt that the bowling change by Azam made no sense because if you have three bowlers, the pace bowlers have taken the early wickets, you want to keep at least one ongoing from one end. He was well aware that you can’t really go through long spells, but one person could have been bowling from one end and Shadab or Nawaz from the other end.
Suggesting Babar clearly missed a trick in India’s Asia Cup opener, Gavaskar observed that Rohit and Co. managed to stage a fightback after a top-order collapse. Middle-order batters Hardik Pandya and Ishan Kishan smashed half-centuries to help India register a fighting total. Pandya and Kishan’s fifth-wicket stand was worth 138 runs off 141 balls.
The batting icon went on to claim that India would have struggled to cross the 200-run mark had the Pakistani pacers dismissed either Pandya or Kishan earlier in the innings.
When Afridi dismissed Pandya for 87 off 90 balls, the Kishan-starrer side had already scored 239 runs in 43 overs. He meant that India will be saying a big thank you because that’s what allowed the partnership to flourish because otherwise, if one of the pacers had taken just that one wicket between Ishan Kishan and Hardik Pandya, then maybe India would have struggled to reach even 175, 200.
News Edit K.V.Raman
