ODI World Cup 2023: 'Afghanistan played better,' former skippers lament poor show by Pakistan

Pakistan's World Cup 2023 campaign almost came to an end after England won the toss and elected to bat first in both teams' last league match on November 11 in Kolkata. Pakistan needed to restrict England for 50 and chase it down in about 2.4 overs if bowling first, which they did, but England raced away to 96 in first 16 overs.

Pakistan have no one but themselves to blame as they lost four games on the trot in the tournament and New Zealand won their last league game by a huge margin to virtually shut the door on Pakistan's semifinal hopes. Talking ahead of their game against England, two former Pakistan skippers - Shoaib Malik and Wasim Akram conceded that Afghanistan played better than Pakistan.

“Afghanistan played better cricket than us,” Malik said.

“India is the only team from the sub-continent, who has qualified for the last four. In my opinion, if we are just sticking with this World Cup then yes Afghanistan have played better cricket than us,” Malik added.

Akram, who was part of Pakistan's 1992 World Cup-winning campaign, also agreed with Malik.

“Afghans looked stronger. Maybe, our boys looked fatigued because they were playing cricket continuously. Afghanistan cricketers looked better than Pakistan, there is no doubt,” said Akram.

Pakistan were four and four after eight games. They had started the tournament well with wins over Netherland and Sri Lanka before losing four games on the trot against India, Australia, Afghanistan and South Africa. Pakistan then won the two back to back games against Bangladesh and New Zealand to give themselves a shot at the semifinals.

Pakistan had a NRR of +0.036 after eight games and had to beat England to get a NRR of +0.744 or better with 10 points. Batting first, Pakistan would have needed a win margin of 287 runs.