DHAKA: Pakistan captain Mohammad Hafeez on Tuesday apologised to his team's fans for not doing better in the key game against West Indies which defeated them by 84 runs in Dhaka and reached semi finals of the World T20.
It was the first time that Pakistan, finalists in the inaugural World T20 in 2007 and champions in 2009, failed to reach the knock-out rounds in the five editions of the tournament.
“I must thank our fans for their support and apologise for letting them down,” he said.
“This was obviously not our best performance, but we had the game in control at the start.”
“All credit to the West Indies for taking the game away from us. Those four final overs cost us dearly and then we panicked at the start of our chase. It became a very difficult target to chase,” said the Pakistani captain.
“Our aim was to get to at least 135-140 with the start we got but the self-belief we had, the form and power that we have, the momentum (being) with us, there was chance to be positive and get 160.”
“In the last four overs, even our best bowlers Saeed Ajmal and Umar Gul did not get their basics right and conceded too many runs in the end... When our chase started, we did not get any momentum, playing shots which were not there,” said Hafeez.
Meanwhile, Dwayne Bravo, who was named man of the match, said he would have preferred to share it with Captain Darren Sammy and Samuel Badree.
“We have the bowling to defend any total, but I really did not expect the match to be so easy,” he said.
“Pakistan did have our top order in some bother, but then our batting runs deep and we showed that today.”
“I think Sammy and Badree were equally deserving of the award. We have the momentum going into the semi-finals and I am confident we will do well there too,” said the West Indian player.
“We had nothing to lose, we were under pressure,” he said, adding that, “I said to Sammy 'Don't worry about picking (Pakistani spinner Saeed) Ajmal or trying to rotate (strike) ... Keep your eyes on the ball. We are powerful enough. If we get close to the ball, we'll hit it over the ropes'.”
