What went wrong for Pakistan in the Semi Final?

[shuntmaster]

Match fixing??

 

[Markus]

My personal opinion - The current crop of Pakistani cricketers lack the aggression that your previous generation had.

 

[hembo]

I found this excellent analysis of Misbah's (Mis)inning in cricinfo:

Misbah's mystery innings

Misbah-ul-Haq's strike rate at the end of his innings was 73.68; Tendulkar's rate for his 85 was 73.91. That, perhaps, is as good an example as any to illustrate the fact that stats without context is meaningless. Misbah's inexplicable go-slow through the first half of his innings resulted in the asking rate climbing to unmanageable proportions, and it also forced the other batsmen to take risks that might otherwise have been unnecessary. He tried to make up for it later, but apart from helping him reach a personal landmark and improving his strike-rate, his late hits counted for little.

Overall, Misbah played out 42 dot balls, which was the most among Pakistan's batsmen. In his first 42 balls, he scored only 17 and played 27 dots. During this period, Pakistan's asking rate went up from 6.07 to 8.45. Younis Khan's sluggish innings didn't help either - add his 13 from 32 balls to Misbah's 17 in his first 42, and Pakistan have every reason to feel their two most experienced batsmen didn't serve them well: in those 74 balls, the two batsmen got a grand total of 30 runs, with no boundaries. Even with the power-hitters to follow, that was a bridge too far.


Misbah's mis-paced innings

Runs Dots 1s/ 2s 4s/ 6s
First 42 balls 17 27 13/ 2 0/ 0
Last 34 balls 39 15 13/ 0 5/ 1
Full innings (76 balls) 56 42 26/ 0 5/ 1

Another reason:

The crucial first 15 overs

As it turned out, almost all the experts read the wicket wrong. MS Dhoni and Sachin Tendulkar admitted as much in the post-match presentation, and from the scores it's obvious that run-making was a lot more difficult on this Mohali pitch than it was expected to be. The team composition and the early overs suggested a score of around 300 would be a par total, but later events showed it was another subcontinent track on which run-scoring against the hard new ball was much easier.

In that context, the difference between the two teams was the runs they scored in the first 15 overs, when the ball was new. Pakistan's top three played useful cameos too, but none of them exploded in the manner that Virender Sehwag had. Sehwag's 25-ball 38 allowed India to rack up 99 in the first 15 overs, compared to Pakistan's 70. The difference of 29 was exactly the margin by which Pakistan lost the match, which means in the remaining 35 overs, the two teams scored exactly the same number of runs. Of course, the approaches of the two teams at the start were obviously different since Pakistan knew the target in front of them, but Pakistan struggled as much as India did in the middle overs. What made their case worse was the fact that they got no reciprocal help from the Indian fielders, or from the dew which was expected to set in later in the evening.

 

[Mike2011]

Misab must be millionier now. Pak gov should keep watch on his bank account.

 

[rockstarIN]

Very poor fielding, what else? give away more extras than India under pressure.

 

[Markus]

No point in blaming Misbah alone.

Why did Afridi not take power play earlier?

Well, if you ask me , it didn't seem the Pakistani players were even hungry for a victory, they were too happy that they had reached the semi finals that they didn't even feel like going to the finals.

 

[Humanist]

Pakistan team lacks professionalism... they have to adopt modern way of coaching...
India has changed the way it is being coached,,, we had australian way of coaching previously but we have moved to southafrican way in last few years... that is the reason we became consistent... that is the reason we are No1 in test and No2 in one days from last 2 years... (Just imagine we dont have great bowlers but still we managed to do it for last 2 years and more)...

Dhoni has a skill of great manager... He knows how to utilize his limited resources(bowlers) to the mazimum

 

[Humanist]

Jason kreza is better bowler than Yuvraj.. But Ricky pointing didnt know how to use him properly but Dhoni on the other hand utilized yuvraj to the maximum

 

[Manas]

mujhe misbah par shak kai.....

kuch na kuch chacker challa hai..

1)dropped easy catches..
2)itne dere kel raha tha jaise ki test mach ho.. saare over kha gaya.... aur baad me 2-4 shot laga kar apne par se doubt hata rahaaa tha..

This is totally silly thing to say.

Mishab was going with the right approach. Target was only 260.

Pakistan batmen were playing shots as if the target was 360 and getting out.

If only they were able to preserve wicket , they could've chased 260 in the final five overs with PP.

Mishab could've made bigger hits if he had the support of another dependable batsmen.

 

[genmirajborgza786]

best of luck to India & Sri Lanka for the Final's

& well played Pakistan you guys have nothing to be ashmed of Pakistan started as a broken team was not even in the same leauge as Australia,England,West Indies,Sauth africa,India,Sri Lanka & from there they picked themself up like a rocket beating the likes of Sri Lanka,
then they beat an giant of a team known as "Australia" @ 177 all out ! reached the Semi-Final's with grace became the Hot Fav's of the tournament Pakistan bounced back on track what more could have the Pakistanis asked for i dont know about them but team Pakistan has us Canadian's & many Indians,Australian's,Sri Lankan's & many other Teams "Respect"

 

[Jango]

younis khan was miserable.....if you drop four catches of tendulkar you are never going to the final. the batting order was the whole problem....even after the poor fielding show....260 was a very chaseable score.....if younis has to keep wicket then bring him earlier than asad shafiq and misbah was good in the end but earlier he put all the pressure on umar akmal...just score singles or a boundary in one over as well....but i am not lambasting the team....well done to them to get this far....nobody had any expectations of them. maybe we should get miandad as batting coach as well because waqar has got the bowling doing good.

 

[Jango]

before the ball afridi got out he tried to hit that one also...he was losing his nerves a bit....why the hell not take the powerplay then???

---------- Post added at 11:17 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:16 AM ----------

younis should only play test matches...

 

[Manas]

younis khan was miserable.....if you drop four catches of tendulkar you are never going to the final. the batting order was the whole problem....even after the poor fielding show....260 was a very chaseable score.....if younis has to keep wicket then bring him earlier than asad shafiq and misbah was good in the end but earlier he put all the pressure on umar akmal...just score singles or a boundary in one over as well....but i am not lambasting the team....well done to them to get this far....nobody had any expectations of them. maybe we should get miandad as batting coach as well because waqar has got the bowling doing good.

India was 217 at the end of 44th over with six wickets down.

Then Raina made an knock out 36 which made made crucial difference in the end .

Pakistan kept losing wickets at regular interval .

Umar Akmal's bold out the turning point of the match.

 

[Manas]

before the ball afridi got out he tried to hit that one also...he was losing his nerves a bit....why the hell not take the powerplay then???

---------- Post added at 11:17 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:16 AM ----------

younis should only play test matches...

Afridi was both careless and over confident , in spite of being almost got caught by Nehra , he made a silly shot and got out.

 

[sab]

This is totally silly thing to say.

Mishab was going with the right approach. Target was only 260.

Pakistan batmen were playing shots as if the target was 360 and getting out.

If only they were able to preserve wicket , they could've chased 260 in the final five overs with PP.

Mishab could've made bigger hits if he had the support of another dependable batsmen.

I think your post is more silly. Mishbah sould have rotated strikes and kept scoreboard ticking. Instead he got sucked, let asking rate scoring and created huge pressure on other batsmans.