Former India all-rounder and now a commentator, Irfan Pathan is not pleased with the adjudicators who picked Fakhar Zaman as the Man of the Match choice for the Pakistan vs Bangladesh game on Tuesday in Kolkata.
Pakistan registered the most emphatic of their three wins in the World Cup 2023 as they thrashed Bangladesh by 7 wickets in Kolkata. The decision-makers were split for the Man of the Match award between Fakhar Zaman, who scored 81 runs in 74 balls which helped Pakistan ace their run-chase of 205 runs and also boost their NRR, and Shaheen Afridi, who picked three wickets of the top 5 batsmen – Tanzid Hasan, Najmul Shanto, and Mahmudullah.
While Fakhar gave a cracking start with the bat in the chase, Shaheen had set up the win with his three strikes, the first two of which came in his opening spell. Shaheen finished with figures of 9-1-23-3.
Shaheen should have been awarded Man of the match: Irfan Pathan
Irfan Pathan praised Pakistan for their aggressive cricket today, marched by Fakhar Zaman. However, Irfan Pathan asserted that the Man of the Match award should have gone to Shaheen Afridi for his match-winning spell.
“Playing against Bangladesh who is down and out in their confidence, Pakistan needed to play aggressive. They did that very well. Shaheen should have been awarded Man of the match,” Irfan Pathan tweeted.
Upon taking the Man of the Match award, Fakhar Zaman said: “After the Asia Cup, I practiced a lot on my batting, I was looking good at the camp and was looking forward to making it to the team. Today, my hard work paid off after I was given a chance. I told Abdullah that I will see off the first few overs, I knew I could hit big sixes. My role is to make it easy for my partner, so it was important to see off the first few overs and then play my shots. NRR was in our mind after we reached 100, the aim was to finish it off in 30 overs. I had too many failures, I was looking towards such a knock and hopefully I’ll make bigger scores in the next few games.”
