In a thrilling matchup between South Africa and Pakistan for the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023 in Chennai, South Africa prevailed by a single wicket. The Proteas, who had appeared to be well on pace before losing four wickets for 25 runs with the finish line in sight, were led by Keshav Maharaj, who maintained his composure to smash the winning runs. The final runs came off the bowling error of Mohammad Nawaz which made Babar Azam absolutely furious.
Pakistan gave it their best in the last wicket struggle, but they were unable to seal the historic victory under the Chidambaram lights.
The top scorers for Pakistan in their opening innings were Babar Azam (50) and Saud Shakeel (52) with seven of the top eight scoring in double figures.
Aiden Markram appeared to be leading South Africa to win with a strong knock during the chase.
However, Markram ut was undone by injured substitute Usama Mir when he was nine runs away from a century, resulting in a tense conclusion to the match in Chennai.
But South Africa managed to hold on, Maharaj’s flick to the backward square boundary helped his team cross the finish line and set off wild celebrations.
Babar Azam angry at Mohammad Nawaz
Just a few seconds after South Africa’s Keshav Maharaj hit the game-winning boundary, Pakistani skipper Babar Azam was seen yelling at his bowler Mohammad Nawaz for bowling a simple delivery.
Based on his body language, it appeared that the former batsman screamed at Nawaz for making a mistake in his line right from the start of his over, which was a crucial moment in the match. After careful examination by OneCricket, it may be inferred that the Pakistani captain shouted: “Aur kuch nahi aata kya, bus ek hi ball daalta hai.”
For the first time ever in a World Cup, Pakistan have lost four straight games.
Pakistan is still technically alive in the 2023 World Cup, but this narrow defeat would hurt the team even more and make their remaining three games challenging.
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