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The Pakistan captain apologises for his team’s World Cup performance after they were knocked out at the group stage.
Pakistan captain Babar Azam has said the team’s batting let them down at the Twenty20 World Cup as he apologised to fans for failing to reach the Super Eight stage.
Pakistan fell to the tournament’s biggest upset when the USA, a tier-two member of the game, beat the 2009 champions via Super Over. The defeat by archrivals India then left Babar’s side with a mountain to climb to advance.
India and USA bagged the two Super Eight slots from Group A while Pakistan finished third after Sunday’s laboured three-wicket victory against Ireland.
“Thank you so much for supporting us, and sorry for that performance,” Babar said after the match in Florida.
“I know the fans and the team are saddened by this. It is not any one player’s fault. We all made a mistake.”
Babar had stepped down as captain of all three formats after Pakistan failed to make the knockout stage of the 50-over World Cup in India last year, but was reinstated as white-ball skipper ahead of the 20-overs showpiece in the US and the West Indies.
Amid subpar performances at the tournament, talk of rifts within the camp surfaced, while Pakistan Cricket Board’s chief promised “major surgery” on the team after their exit was confirmed last week.
Pakistan’s batting was a huge disappointment as they failed to make the most of the powerplay overs and could not get partnerships established.
“The pitches here helped the fast bowlers a little but I think overall our batting did not click,” said Babar.
“We lost two crucial matches even when we were in charge.”
All-rounder Imad Wasim has said the team needed a complete reset of their approach to white-ball cricket and Babar agreed.
“Every player has to think because cricket has become very fast. With modern cricket, you must have game awareness,” he said.
“You know that the strike rate here is [low] … I think it’s about game awareness and common sense.”
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