New Delhi, India

Former India player and World Cup-winning captain Kapil Dev has backed the leadership of Babar Azam despite the Pakistan team’s poor show in India. Pakistan led by Babar faced elimination from the tournament in the league stage as they faced early exit while hosts and rivals India will play in the semifinals. According to Kapil, one tournament should not decide the fate of the skipper, underlining he had earlier led them to the number one spot in the ICC Rankings.

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Kapil backs Babar

"If you say that Babar Azam is not the right choice [for captaincy] today, it is because you are looking at just his current performance. He was the same captain, who made Pakistan team No.1 [in ICC ODI rankings] six months ago,” Kapil said during the podcast with Ranveer Allahbadia.

"When someone gets out for zero, 99 per cent of the people would want him to be dropped. If an ordinary player comes and scores a brilliant hundred, then they call him a superstar. So don’t look at just current performance. Look at how he has approached the game, how much passion and talent he has," added the 1983 World Cup-winning captain.

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Pakistan’s downfall

Pakistan started the World Cup on a positive note having beaten the Netherlands and Sri Lanka, with the latter win coming in a record-breaking chase. However, their defeat to India started their downfall as they went on to lose four matches on the bounce, including an excruciating loss to Afghanistan in Chennai.

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They later beat Bangladesh and New Zealand, but with poor Net Run Rate (NRR) and luck going against them, they lost the battle to reach the semifinals and finished fifth. This meant they have failed to reach the semifinals since the 2011 edition when they lost to India. Their ODI World Cup drought also extends for another four years having last tasted glory in 1992 under the captaincy of Imran Khan.