Visibly shaken Pakistan captain Babar Azam admitted “we are hurt” after his staff was surprised in an eight-wicket defeat by Afghanistan on the World Cup on Monday which put their semi-finals hopes in peril. Afghanistan achieved their first-ever one-day victory over Pakistan in eight makes an attempt as they chased down a 283-run goal with an over to spare. Ibrahim Zadran hit a superb 113-ball 87 whereas fellow opener Rahmanullah Gurbaz made a 53-ball 65 to construct a powerful platform, placing on 130 for the primary wicket.

Rahmat Shah‘s unbeaten 84-ball 77 and skipper Hashmatullah Shahidi‘s 48 not out sealed victory in opposition to a sloppy Pakistan staff.

“We are hurt as a team,” stated Azam whose aspect now have three defeats and two wins in 5 matches.

They face a formidable South Africa on the similar Chennai venue on Friday.

“We must feel the disappointment and my message to my team for the remaining matches will be to learn from this defeat,” stated Azam, whose 74 off 95 balls aided by opener Abdullah Shafique‘s 58 guided Pakistan to 282-7 after they received the toss and batted.

“We achieved what we set out to do when we batted but we were not up to the mark in bowling and fielding,” stated Azam whose bowlers conceded 17 boundaries within the first 16 overs.

“We failed to put them under pressure but I congratulate Afghanistan for this victory.”

Afghanistan, who performed 4 specialist spinners on Monday, additionally now have two wins in 5 matches.

“Afghanistan’s spinners are of good quality so the plan was to not give them wickets until the 40th over and then charge in the last ten but we fell some 10-15 runs short,” stated Azam.

Noor Ahmad, 18, was the decide of the Afghanistan spinners with 3-49 on his World Cup debut whereas the extra skilled sluggish bowlers, Rashid Khan and Mujeeb Ur Rahman went wicketless.

Despite Monday’s shock defeat, Azam burdened Pakistan can nonetheless qualify for the semi-finals.

“From now on we need to play our best cricket in all departments and must overcome our mistakes.”

Azam admitted that the staff is affected by the absence on the match of quick bowler Naseem Shah who was dominated out of the World Cup with a shoulder harm.

“Of course, Naseem is missed badly because he had been part of our scheme but overall our bowling has not clicked,” stated Azam.

“We knew there are no margin for error on these grounds and we failed to execute plans.”

He added: “We have been perfect in training but I think our bowlers over-tried in matches and have leaked runs. We need to focus on positives and adopt a different mind-set.”

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