Watch highlights from India vs Pakistan – the 2011 World Cup SemiFinal played at Mohali on March 30
Scoreline: India 260/9 – Sachin Tendulkar 85 (115), Sehwag 38 (25), Raina 36 no (39) | Wahab Riaz 10-46-5, Ajmal 10-44-2
Pakistan 231 all out – Misbah ul Haq 56 (76), Hafeez 43 (59), Shafiq 30 (39) | Nehra 10-33-2, Munaf 10-1-40-2, Zaheer, Harbhajan, Yuvraj, 2 each
Whenever a team loses a big game, it’s natural to search for a villain, usually one individual. When India lost vs SA, it was Dhoni and Nehra. Today, Nehra was picked and was fantastic despite Dhoni later admitting he might have misread the pitch. Similarly, Raina for Yusuf has worked in 2 games. So, when it works, it’s all good. Getting back to this game, it’s quite likely that Misbah will be picked on. It’s usually the case – the last man standing is the last one to stick in your memory. But the reality is several:
i. Pak had it stacked against them when they lost the toss and had to chase something over 250.
ii. The Indian bowling looks and is better than normal when defending a target in a pressure game.
iii. Pak’s fielding fell away. Which further took out the Afridi-inspiration factor that along with Riaz might perhaps have lowered the target
And in the context of Misbah:
i. It’s his game. Even in test cricket, he’ll go through extended periods of silence before exploding in a flurry.
ii. For a long time now, even before Asad Shafiq came in, the need to break up the middle order with someone like Umar Akmal has been obvious but ignored.
Misbah’s threat just needs to be gauged from the Mohali crowd. They were quiet even when it was 30 off the last over and only really came alive when it reached the stage of sixers every ball not being enough.
Sourav Ganguly raised an important point about Sachin while the game was on in which he said it was almost like he was embarrassed to be still batting. As a Tendulkar fan (and a self-proclaimed expert on the man), I’ve always seen that the quality of his batting within an innings goes down, the more the reprieves he gets. Almost like he feels guilty about it.
Great to see Afridi once again taking it well. Those who watched the 2007 T20 final will recall him giving Harbhajan a sincere bearhug after the game was done. My point is not about whether being a sport immediately after a loss is the right or wrong thing. More that it’s a special ability and deserves respect.
What musn’t be forgotten in the middle of all this is that Afridi did what he promised – to lead his team to a WC semifinal when most experts didn’t give them a chance.
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INDIA IS THE BEST!!!THEY GOT SKILLS
I reckon the world cup is India’s .Imagine the party that would be if they can pull it off in front of their home fans It has been a very difficult knockout stage having to play Australia and then Pakistan but any team that beats the Aussies deserves to win it all.Mumbai is the place to be on Saturday.Same old story for Pakistan and a case of what could have been if only catches were held.Still a very good game to watch and a very impressive performance from Wahab Riaz .
Sachin deserves a to have a farewell as a world cup winner.He has been amazing to watch and such a true champion..!Can’t really imagine an Indian team without Mr Sachin Tendulkar.
Hard luck Badsubby…!
Yeah man, what are you gonna do lol? I’m still proud of Afridi and company because of the mere fact that they made it this far when no one even gave them a chance and people like Chappal just hated on them. Riaz surprised all of us because i really thought he was gonna get whacked but guess what Gul surprised me too lol. Like you say what it could’ve been…Tendu could’ve been out at 27 or 45 at most but it wasnt meant to be. They talk about the cat’s 9 lives…I think we need a new analogy lol. 260 still wasnt bad but our batsmen just couldnt step up which was expected. I’m still proud of the Pakistani team and they deserve a hero’s welcome once they arrive in Pakistan. Good luck to India and SL, even though India has it in the bag.
Now we need another series between NZ and PAK lol…Clash of the Titans…NOT!
Since pakistan won 2-1 in the one dayers in New Zealand, it is only fair that new Zealand get a chance to make a mense. lol.
NZ fan
Tough luck dude — was thinking of the punjagi totey clip you had posted that I laughed at for hours and hours.. was kinda part of pakistan’s undoing this time around too.. all the best for future tournaments. You guys have great talent and hopefully this world cup has revitalized the fan base and gets the cricket team moving away from the shadows of the recent past.. Afridi is a great ambassador .. I find it very endearing how affectionate he is with some of the Indian players.. and vice versa.
Even his closing comments show his patriotism and sportsmanship – “I want to say sorry to my nation.. but I think everybody enjoyed (watching us)”
The Quality of cricket played today was of the highest class. Especially, the Pakistan bowling. It made me so so nervous as an Indian fan during the game. For once the Indian batsmen lived upto their reputation of being the world’s most dreaded batting line up. The application shown was admirable. When the Pakistan bowlers were bowling I felt so many times that any other side except India would have not got to even 200 runs (and I include Australia in saying that) looking at Pakistan bowling today. As rightly pointed out by Tendulkar Raina’s innings (and his partnership with Harbhajan) was in many ways very crucial. In a knock out game, anything over 250 would always be difficult to chase irrespective of the conditions (as rightly pointed out by Admin and also by Chappell during the innings break) (don’t ask me what Siddhu was talking about!!!!)
Saeed Ajmal is a treat to watch (well, I have to admit wasn’t enjoying his skills during the match live!!!!!). and so is Hafeez while bowling. Hafeez always looks to have a cool head while bowling and comes across as a street smart cricketer. While batting he seemed to be in charge and even during between overs was seemingly calming his partners at the other end. I don’t know what happened when he played the shot he got out on, but I am not complaining!!!!!!!!!
The start given by Sehwag today might have been the telling difference between the two sides today. His boundaries were delightful.
The two leg before wickets got by Riaz were amazing!!!! I almost have never ever seen two balls in one game which did not move (at least to the naked eye) and were still pitching in line and hitting the stumps considering the length of those two balls. Excellent bowling and excellent umpiring!! Also, Afridi might have missed a trick when he took off Riaz and brought back Gul during the batting power play. Well, when he did that I was so relieved to see Riaz not bowling that over!!! To his credit the on field behaviour of Riaz even during such excellent spells was exemplary!!!!!
Again I would say that the quality of cricket today was excellent, except, if I might say Pakistan batsmen panicked a little bit. But a great game, and to be fair to the Pakistan batsmen its never easy to chase in such big games!!! Also, Afridi Post match was really exemplary. (Yes, the subcontinent fans are very emotional, I hope as fans we become more mature so that captains of our sides don’t have to apologize in front of public the way Afridi did during his interview)
How would Tendulkar be feeling having played all five World Cup games against Pakistan and be on the winning side on all occasions. Amazing!! (1992 World cup, round about the time when I started watching cricket, if I remember correctly was the debut game of Ajay Jadeja and a Rain curtailed game, other memory of course from that game is Miandad Jumping to tease Kiran More. Just recalled this to gauge since how long Tendulkar has been playing!!!!!!!!!!). Now, spare a thought for him, the Final of a World Cup, in Mumbai……..!!!!
It was certainly a top order game. Both sides put their best efforts forward. Mishaps do happen on every end whenever it’s a pressure game. Despite all the odds, accusations, and key suspensions before the Cup, Pakistan team made it to this juncture in the World Cup and with style. That is an achievement on its own.
Best of luck to India in the finals. May the best team win!
As for Pakistani team, there’s always the T20 world cup
Such a pressure game, it drew some parallels with the first T20 World Cup final. It wasn’t over until the last over. England also had 37 to 39 to get off their last 2 overs when they tied against India. But this time Misbah was alone. Pakistan’s brilliant bowling wasn’t backed up with fielding. Along with South Africa, they are looking like the best bowling team in the world. Things could have been very different if Pakistan didn’t lose wickets at crucial moments.
Bowling will be the key in the final for India in the final ! Nehra or Ashwin or Yusuf?
Where r those bad mouth guys who were blabbing on non potential of dhoni and nehra…some cheap people will always be a step ahead for criticizing but will never see appreciate some one… Heartiest congratulation to Pakistani team for giving as an honor to watch this final before final… Pakistanis should be proud on them…they out played India’s strength… But this will not happen in finals we will win with quite a margin…m a mumbaikar n will be there LIVE….
Pakistan wasn’t being Pakistan, I think they let it slip away….
i think pak bowling destroyed the strongest batting side in the world. if only their bowling was backed up with their fielding i think india would’ve struggled to reach 200.
umar gul was a disaster ok yes sehwag is a scary batsman but umar gul was really bad. he was one of the big reasons we lost this. if he bowled tight like he usually does he would’ve only gave about 30 runs instead of whopping 69 runs. pak lost by 29 runs and you can slap those runs in umar gul’s face.
If sachin wasnt given so many lives that automatically subtracts about 40 runs and pak would’ve won. catches win matches.
so many people are blaming our batting but they cant see we did manage to do 231 against very tight bowling and that difference of 29 runs was because of umar gul and our fielding. ok yes younis and misbah were terrible but there shouldnt be 260 in the first place.!!
but even after all those drop catches and bad bowls by gul we were happy to chase 260 and we would’ve aswell… we were all confident cos pak got a good start and even when we lost wickets we still had hope cos it was getable! 8 runs per over required, afridi and misbah at the crease, take the powerplay for f*** sake!!! even when afridi was gone it was still getable!! 12-13 runs per over was STILL getable but misbah turned himself on too late. pakistan can make things happen but 19-20 runs per over was impossible and it was all over by then.
Pakistan didn’t perform to their abilities. I think pakistan has a better team than india, they had a very strong team that ripped india’s batting apart.
india performed to their abilities and did their best. their bowling and fielding was extremely tight and batted to their abilities and they perform like this in every match. If pakistan performed to their abilities india would’ve have lost, pakistan’s batting is weak but managed to get to 231(against ordinary but extremely tight bowling), if umar gul was being himself and pak fielded well then india was a goner… this pakistani team is sharp on the field luckily for india we had a bad day in the field. misbah, younis n umar akmal are extremely good fielders and 3 of the drop catches were off afridi…..
so in the end pakistan lost because of themselves, india didnt beat us, they won by luck.
india performed their best but even their best would’ve not been enough to beat this pak team.
and guys dont you think there was something FISHY about this game???? i mean maybe some politics?? some fixing?? maybe by the governments?? maybe by the governing officials?? maybe cos of safety reasons? political agreement between the 2 countries?
i say all this cos i do have a couple of OTHER reasons beside drop catches, umar gul, score shutting down in the middle overs, useless powerplay etc….
1. Umpire Ian Gould was spot on when he gave Tendulkar out Lbw, so how come the replay showed the ball making a massive deviation???
No wonder Gould was seen shaking his head in disbelief
2. Tendulkar’s reaction everytime he was dropped wasn’t ‘regretting’ as if he knew he was gonna be dropped a few times.
3. Afridi’s reaction wasn’t natural and was feeling helpless from start till the very end as if he couldn’t win this match. In the end all smiles and apologies… trying to convince people they did their best but actually they didnt cos we know this pak team is perfect and better than india (as i said in my other post)
4. Forget umar gul vs sehwag in the start cos that was just bad bowling but did anyone notice 1 of his overs against raina in the end???? every single ball was a full toss!! as if he was trying to ball them and trying to make raina hit him for sixes but raina kind of missed out or failed.
5. Misbah not wanting to take singles – Afridi coming in and not taking the batting power play when there were 12 overs left.
did anyone notice that Misbah and Afridi did not support one another and I don’t think they even talked in the middle.
These two could have made the runs in the five overs themselves.
so yeah there is something wrong and fishy about this game… WHO KNOWS?!
About Point no 1, if i remember right, mark nicholas (in particular) and atherton talked about it several times and stopped short of saying there was something wrong with the predicted path. I think the problem was, someone said it was a doosra and all the commentators blindly followed this reasoning, without looking at the facts. DRS is not perfect, but looking at where it landed and where it hit the pad, can’t really argue with the predicted line. You can also see sachin gesticulating about the turn and angle to gambhir just before it goes into the review replay.
The rest in my opinion is speculative
i’ve watched it closely over and over again if you just see the normal slow motion reply closely before the DRS/Hawkeye you’ll notice something fishy about hawkeye watch the ball closely when it comes out of ajmal’s hands, where it lands, where is the direction of the ball after it pitched and where it hit tendulkar, to me the ball was not going down leg after it pictched and also to Gould
the rest to me is speculative also but it just makes me wonder from their actions, reactions, plans, etc.. why they performed like they are not this same team.. they weren’t being themselves…
also i’ve heard from the media that afridi got a phone call from prime minister Y.Gilani before the match… wonder what that was about… prime ministers dont just call players like that….
though i do think number 4 and 5 are strong points…
and here’s another fishy point: afridi has withdrawn from the next series!!! wow! a successful captain who reunited a team is suddenly calling it quits?? (well temporary) what da hell??? what will happen to this team now…. this whole thing is so fishy to me….
This would have been the biggest match that many of them had played in their lives. Would anybody dare match-fix it ? Knowing what is at stake and what would happen to them if they are found guilty, and especially after seeing what happened to Butt/Asif/Amir. Indian and Pakistani players have constantly be in the focus for the last 1 month.
1) DRS is run by ICC. India has openly opposed the DRS system in the past.
2) Tendulkar has rarely been expressive of his emotions while he bats.
4) It wasn’t Umar Gul’s day. His bowling in the last two overs reminded me of the last few overs against New Zealand by Razzaq and Akhtar. Afridi should not have given him the 49th over after he obviously looked out of touch even in the 47th.
5) I noticed in the quarter final, Afridi picked up a WI wicket and Misbah went to congratulate him but Afridi said something that didn’t look nice.
Your Point 5 reminded me – when afridi finally takes sachin’s catch you can see misbah run up to him and do that punishment thing, you know, holding your ears and doing situps (Ind Bat 4 – around 9:05 onwards). seems like they were laughing about their earlier messups
Regarding the opening of your post…. What about the 1999 World Cup Final???? (I know the games against India and Bangladesh in that World cup were meaningless but the Final!!!!)
The Hawkeye has obvious limitations which are apparent on many occasions. Generally, the hawkeye projections show the ball hitting (when to the naked eye its not the case) but in Tendulkars case it was the opposite. But I don’t think it was deliberate. There is not time enough for making such adjustments I guess.
I strongly believe that lot of the matches are fixed these days (includng about 99% of the IPL games, probably) but I don’t think this game was fixed. If it was, then I believe we all need to find some other sport to follow!!!!!!!
about the hawkeye, ajmal said “I don’t know how the television replays showed my delivery turning towards the leg side because I had bowled an arm ball and it went straight,”
lol world cup 1999 final was such a fixer! did you see pak’s performance?? it was ridiculous! pakistani team might be called unpredictable but some matches are just too ridiculous to believe. like this match drop catches were ridiculous…
ok i just heard that investigations about this match are being held in high court of pakistan or something… this indian guy i know here said he heard from the media pcb and pak government got paid around 60 billion dollars or sumthin… afridi got a call from gilani and all players must act… of course i dont believe fully but i have doubts…
here’s a link of a video that was posted before the match on 29th (if you understand urdu): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-gJ_O8lCYw
i mean pakistan didnt perform like themselves its like they were acting if you look at it closely… if a normal person who doesn’t really know bowling tried to bowl good bowls wouldn’t manage full toss every single delivery…
here’s what it all seemed to me: umar gul will be the bad bowler and make people think he had a bad day, after he’s gone for some runs, bring in ajmal, hafeez, riaz and afridi to perform to their abilities and make people think pakistan is putting pressure on india but drop 4-5 catches so there isnt much damage done after a while if india didn’t manage to do much score bring back umar gul who will bowl 8-10 full tosses. later try to get a flying start so people think pakistan is going well then get rid of the openers and shutdown the score by younis and misbah while players at the other end will play aggressively and lose their wickets “foolishly” and in the end when everything is impossible let misbah fire so people will think he “tried”.
in the end try to smile and calm people down lol….
so yeah call me and millions of people crazy…..lol oh But one thing they forgot! they took the powerplay too late maybe they “just forgot” that created a huge doubt in people’s minds…. and misbah n afridi dont talk to eachother there is some thing going on in between them…..
afridi, misbah, younis and razzaq might not be going to west indies, though its still to be confirmed by PCB… something is going on for sure, hope they investigate it fully….
you are right..it is difficult to beat pakistan as they are all ______…and talented and highly educated..
when analyzing a cricket game , you don’t do if’s and but’s…you cannot assume that they could’ve caught sachin and everything would’ve been the same…
maybe pakis are lucky sehwag got out at 38 …had he stayed for another 20 overs , he would’ve humiliated pakistan…how do we know that…he has single handedly destroyed and humiliated pakis several times…he averages close to 100 in tests and 80 in ODI against Pakistan…
so does Yuvraj…maybe it is sheer luck that a guy with such incredible form and a destroyer of Paki bowling (check out yuvi records against Pak in recent years) got out first ball…thank god Dhoni didn’t go berserk on you…
it is not the fact that pakistan dropped those catches but going back 50 years Pakis had the worst fielding side ever….even Imran Khan was the worst fielder among the all rounders…_________________________
please refrain from religious or nationality-related attacks
mark, yeah you are right pakistan has the worst players ever they haven’t scored a single run and never took a single wicket EVER…. their bowlers get hit for a boundary every bowl… and their batsmen always go for a duck…. what losers….
There were some rubbish reports in India before the match that claimed that India will lose to Pakistan, as the match is fixed. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqsT90MqL-g
Hope the idiotic channel that reported this hang their heads in shame, now that India has won the world cup.
what ? I was hoping you would get back to your national past time…DENIAL…and all I’m getting is a candid admission of your abilities ? Hmmm…looks like there is hope after all for you guys…
Ali , my point is simply this… in any sport , you don’t say things like if only that happened , we would’ve won…it assumes a universe with outcomes where everything goes in your favour…reality is not like that…you take your misfortune with good ones…if only we had caught it , if only that ball had missed the stumps , if only …if only…it doesn’t work like that.
over 100 overs , 600 balls , your team had an opportunity to put the game away and they didn’t . That is the reality. you accept it and go back and work on being better. Or you kid yourself that your team is the most talented and only misfortune cost you the world cup…where you and your country and team go from here depends on how you look at things…your _______ cricket team is in a place that is of its own making…stop blaming UDRS , ICC , ______
that was 8 minutes I’ll never get back watching the video clip you posted — glad to confirm that I understand Urdu though
The dude being interviewed is a conspiracy theorist and even the newscaster was totally skeptical throughout the interview.
i know right! lol everytime the guy said somthing, the newscaster was like WHAT O_O’ lol
Too bad Pakistan lost. They lost because of the same chronic problem. fielding, batting and Pakistan didnt take the last batting power play earlier which was stupid. I am still proud of them. Indians played a fantastic game. I hope they win the World Cup. Misbah should only play Test cricket. He played this game as if he was playing test cricket.