CricketViewer.com

Shoaib Malik has admitted Pakistan had been unaware that their match, against India in the World Twenty20 here on Friday night, would be decided on the basis of a bowl-out in case of a tie.

“When the match ended in a tie, only then we came to know that this (bowl out) would happen,” he said at the post-match press conference. “I just told my bowlers not to take pressure and try and hit the wickets but they were not successful,” he expressed. When Misbah-ul-Haq was run out off the last ball with the scores level, some confusion prevailed among the players with regard to the result of the match. The bowl-out followed, which India won 3-0.

“The match ended in a tie, so none of my players should be blamed (for losing),” Malik said. He also dismissed the notion that Pakistan would have been better served using the big-hitting Shahid Afridi higher up in the order. “We needed one off the last two balls. Anyway he’s more useful to us after 12 overs,” he explained.

Malik agreed that Pakistan’s batting line-up needs to improve as it couldn’t perform well in the two preliminary round matches (against Scotland and India). “Definitely we have to show improvement as bowlers did a great job, especially Mohammad Asif. But their hard work was spoiled by a few batting flaws and I believe in the coming stage of the tournament more perfection and responsibility lies on part of the batsmen,” he asserted.

When asked about the performance of the vice-captain, Salman Butt, Malik said the batsman looked off-coloured has the first two games and hopefully he would be out of bad patch soon to support the team.

“We cannot determine the performance of a player based on his showing in a couple of matches. We need to wait for a while as the tournament is not over yet,” he said. Malik said the team had not been under pressure before the match. He said the morale of the team was still high for the upcoming matches and the players would do better.

Source:Cricket News