According to Babar Azam, Pakistan’s inability to chase down 120 in their T20 World Cup 2024 encounter against India in New York was mostly due to their poor use of the batting powerplay and their overuse of dot balls in the middle overs.
Following Pakistan’s six-run loss, Babar remarked, “In our minds, we wanted to play normally, utilise the first six overs in the batting and [if we had done that] we win.” “But after losing one wicket, we failed to perform well in the first six overs. We didn’t capitalise on our opportunities, and sure, we repeated the same error after the ten overs. We were aiming for about 40 to 45 runs in the first six overs.”
Although Pakistan limited India to 119 runs, they did not surrender many wickets in the early going. After scoring 35 for 1 during the powerplay, they moved 72 for 2 in 12 overs. Following that, Jasprit Bumrah and Hardik Pandya organised a collapse. Bumrah smashed through Mohammad Rizwan’s stumps with the opening delivery of his second stint, and Hardik took out Fakhar Zaman with an excellent short ball.
In the middle overs (6.1 to 15.6), Pakistan employed 29 dot balls, making 50 runs but losing three wickets.
“After 10 overs, we bowled brilliantly and might have taken 120. Here, the total is better. We batted at run-a-ball, but regrettably, we lost consecutive wickets and there were an excessive number of dot balls, according to Babar. “The strategy was straightforward: play regularly, rotate the strike, try to play one boundary, and be normal. Get five or six in an over. However, there were too many dot balls during that time, so the strain was on us. And we dropped two or three wickets in a row.”
Pakistan is now having trouble advancing past the first round of the World Cup after suffering back-to-back losses to begin the competition. Babar stated that they simply want to win their final two Group A matches before
