Despite having a strong start to the Asia Cup 2023,
the Babar Azam-led Pakistan cricket team was unable to maintain the momentum
and was eliminated from the Super 4 round. The injuries to Haris Rauf and
Naseem Shah also set behind the Pakistani team. Despite their best efforts,
Pakistan was defeated by Sri Lanka after failing to cross the finish line as
the match’s winners. Since it was one of the major tournaments prior to the
Cricket World Cup in India, the team will be troubled by the loss to Sri Lanka
for a very long time.
To make matters worse, the Pakistani skipper Babar
Azam and Shaheen Afridi allegedly got into a verbal altercation following
Pakistan’s loss to Sri Lanka. Babar reportedly questioned the senior players’
position in the Asia Cup 2023 campaign following the defeat. Shaheen, however,
cut him off and advised him to avoid making generalisations and complimenting
those who performed well. Babar immediately retorted that he is fully aware of
who is succeeding and who is failing. According to the story, Babar attended
the news conference following the defeat and avoided making any small
conversation when travelling to the hotel.
Sri Lanka defeated Pakistan by two wickets in the Asia
Cup’s last-ball thriller, thanks to Kusal Mendis’ 91 and Charith Asalanka’s
unbeaten 49, setting up a showdown with India in the championship game. In the
42-overs-a-side match in Colombo, Sri Lanka needed eight runs from the final
over to reach the DLS-revised target of 252, which they did with Asalanka’s
decisive knock on the penultimate ball. Millions of cricket fans who were
hoping for an India-Pakistan final in the 50-over competition as a lead-up to
the 2019 ODI World Cup were devastated by the outcome, despite the rowdy home
crowd’s joy.