Karachi: The Indian team surprisingly lacked aggression in the semifinals of the Asia Emerging Nations Cup in Bangladesh, observed Saud Shakeel, who led Pakistan to the title, last week.
Pakistan beat India in the semifinals by three runs and then hosts Bangladesh in the final to lift the trophy.
“We know that a match against India is always a tough challenge because they come at your aggressively and play hard but when we played India in the semifinals. I was a bit surprised at their hesitant approach,” Shakeel said at a press meet here Monday.
“We were a bit surprised to see that this Indian team was not that aggressive and they didn’t come very hard at us. In fact I and two other players were warned thrice by the umpires to cool it down as we going at them hard,” he added.
Shakeel said that winning against India was a big achievement for him. “We were more aggressive and keen to win than them. That is the impression I got after the match. It was a great close match and we won because of great death overs from Muhammad Hasnain and Ammad Butt.”
India lost the match in the final over and Shakeel said the win gave Pakistan them the confidence that they could win the final.
“In contrast the Bangladesh team was strong as they had couple of players who had just played against other countries and India for the senior team and I got the feeling they were a bit overconfident and complacent.”
Shakeel said this helped Pakistan beat them soundly adding that Emerging Nations Cup should be held every year at the World and Asian levels.
PTI