Hafeez, Wahab star as Pakistan stun England

[ahlam1399]

NOTTINGHAM: Pakistan on Monday shot down high-flying England by 14 runs in a sensational World Cup encounter and in the process ended their 11-match losing spree at Trent Bridge.Rejected as mere pushovers by most critics following their catastrophic showing against West Indies last Friday, Pakistan bounced back with the sort of vengeance that has now placed them among the most dangerous teams of the 10-nation contest.The Pakistanis posted 348 after being asked to bat by England and then managed to counter superb centuries from Joe Root and Jos Buttler to issue a clear warning to other World Cup favourites.Veteran all-rounder Mohammad Hafeez was their biggest star as he smashed a 62-ball 84. The in-form Babar Azam and skipper Sarfraz Ahmed also hit fifties.But despite Pakistan’s big total, England were very much in the hunt with Root amassing 107 to become the first centurion of this World Cup and Buttler (103) smashing the fastest World Cup ton by an Englishman.Just when England were in sight of achieving the biggest successful run-chase in World Cup history, Wahab Riaz, who was discarded as spent force two years ago, struck twice with successive deliveries to seal a memorable victory for Pakistan. He finished with a three-wicket haul. Mohammad Amir and Shadab Khan finished with two wickets apiece. All of them of missed the ODI series against England which Pakistan had lost by a 4-0 margin in the lead up to the World Cup.Hafeez, who was named man-of-the-match, was over the moon.“Everyone believed we can do this. We just needed one winning performance. It was a total team effort,” he said.Skipper Sarfraz Ahmed also hailed his players for the morale-boosting triumph. “I think it’s a great team effort. Fakhar and Imam started well. They got a good start and that’s why we got 350. We tried a few different things — we started with Shadab because they weren’t good against spinners.”While England were surprisingly sloppy in the outfield, Pakistan fared much better. Sarfraz said that it was the main difference between the two teams.“Fielding is an important part and it was the main difference. This gives a lot of confidence to the team,” he said. Eoin Morgan, England’s captain, agreed with his Pakistani counterpart. “Great advertisement for the tournament, but disappointed to be at the wrong end of the tight finish,” he said after the match.“We were out-fielded today and that was probably the difference between the two sides. It was way below par and probably cost us 15-20 runs. They bowled well, they deserve to win. The difference was the fielding I’d say.”Pakistan will now move to Bristol where they will take on Sri Lanka in their third World Cup game on June 7.http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/com/cwEr/~4/Hns33TWJNRI

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