Opinion | India-Pakistan Matches: All Hype, No Rivalry

The present-day Pakistan T20I team is a weak squad incapable of challenging a first-rate team like India.

Indian cricket fans were ecstatic after their team steamrolled Pakistan by 61 runs in the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup match played in Colombo on February 15. Pakistani fans, who had been hoping that the Men in Green would pull off a win against their so-called archrivals, were heartbroken well before the one-sided match ended.

The reactions of Pakistani YouTubers summarised the feelings in the nation, with emotional analysts excoriating the players, the odd TV set broken on the street, and former cricketers highlighting the failures and selection of players in the current T20 squad. We have seen this before. We saw it again. After all, history repeats itself.

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Before and after the Sunday match, billed as the mother of all clashes as usual, Indian skipper Suryakumar Yadav’s classic dig after the Asia Cup Super Fours clash tie in Dubai won by India last year circulated widely.

Responding to a question at the post-match press conference, SKY ruffled feathers in Pakistan when he said, “According to me, if two teams are playing 15-20 matches and the record is 7-all or one team is leading 8-7, that’s called good cricket, and that’s called a rivalry. If it’s 13-0 or 10-1 — I don’t know the exact stat — it is not a rivalry anymore." Cricket has a history of surprising outcomes, but they are not everyday occurrences. And Pakistan need to have an unusually great day on the field to beat a far superior and confident India in today’s times.

After the win on February 15, India have won eight out of nine matches against Pakistan in the T20 World Cup. The only time Pakistan won was in 2021 when they chased down 152 without losing a wicket in a group stage match in Dubai. The two teams have played closely contested nail-biters, though, two of which were in the inaugural edition held in South Africa in 2007.

Since there was no Super Over in those days, India led by MS Dhoni won after a bowl-out after the two teams were locked in a tie. In the thrilling final, Dhoni’s now-famous decision to hand over the last over to medium pacer Joginder Singh proved crucial. Singh dismissed Pakistan skipper Misbah-ul-Haq with his third delivery, resulting in an Indian win by five runs.

Some believed that Dhoni’s decision to give the last over to Singh was a masterstroke, while others viewed it as a stroke of good luck. No matter what the viewpoint might have been, those two close encounters wrote the first chapter of the India-Pakistan history of matches in the T20 World Cup.

The difference between then and now is obvious to most — except some fanatical fans of Pakistani cricket. Even before the recent match began, Team India’s man-to-man superiority was beyond doubt. Pakistan’s decision not to play against India, which it predictably reversed, increased the pre-match hype manifold. That was not surprising, but the one-sidedness of the contest was a disappointment for anybody looking forward to a good contest in cricketing terms.

Skipper Salman Agha chose to field after winning the toss, a bad decision because setting a target would have the wise thing to do in Colombo. Pakistani bowlers had no answer to the assault launched by a fearless Ishan Kishan, who scored 77 off 40 deliveries. SKY, Tilak Varma, Shivam Dube and Rinku Singh chipped in with small but useful scores to set a 176-run target, which was easily above-par on an unpredictable pitch.

Pakistan’s main speedster Shaheen Shah Afridi, legbreak googly bowler Abrar Ahmed and leg-spinning all-rounder Shadab Khan, in his only over, were ineffective and expensive in their respective spells. Analysts questioned the inclusion of Afridi and Khan in the playing eleven, which frequently happens after Pakistan lose a match. Although Saim Ayub picked up three wickets with his mix of leg- and off-spin bowling, he failed in his role of an opener by getting out cheaply. Babar Azam, Pakistan’s star batsman, got out to a pathetic shot, and so did skipper Agha. Had keeper-batsman Usman Khan not scored a 34-ball 44, the team would have been bundled out for less than 100.

Observers also questioned Azam’s presence in the playing eleven after his failure with the bat, and Agha’s captaincy and batting weren’t spared either. Could Fakhar Zaman have replaced Azam and played against India? Was Naseem Shah a better option than Afridi?

Afterthoughts after failures are inevitable, but they cannot mask the fact that the absence of new quality talent capable of competing against a first-rate team like India is the real problem for Pakistan. Moreover, Salman Agha has been frequently criticised for not being the right fit for T20s, while stars like Azam and Afridi are getting a lot of flak for not delivering when it really matters. For many Pakistani fans, that often means playing brilliantly and contributing to wins against India!

In order to compete and occasionally succeed against a thoroughly professional team ranked first in the ICC T20 rankings, which consists of players who have also benefited from the experience of playing in the highly competitive Indian Premier League, Pakistan’s cricketing establishment must find players who are doughty, gifted and appropriate for T20s. Making the Pakistan Super League more competitive for developing quality T20 talent is theoretically possible. But, the question is: can the establishment actually do it?

The writer, a journalist for three decades, writes on literature, cinema and pop culture. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18’s views.

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