All-rounder Imad Wasim is accused of intentionally bowling five dot balls in a tense encounter against India for Pakistan by the former captain Salim Malik. Pakistan’s reply to India’s modest total of 120 runs ended at 113/7, but this happened after they wasted 59 deliveries.
Malik criticized the slow-paced innings of Wasim saying that he scored only fifteen runs from twenty-three balls, which hindered the Pakistan chase.
Malik commented on 24 News channel, “If you look at his (Wasim) innings it seems like he was wasting balls rather than making any scores and complicating things for himself and his partners.”
In addition, another ex-captain Shahid Afridi insinuated about internal divisions within the side implying that there are players not happy with their captain Babar Azam. In support of this view, Afridi noted how important it is for a skipper to foster team spirit and confidence within the squad.
Afridi said, “Either a captain brings along everyone or destroys everything. Let this World Cup go on and I will talk.” He also mentioned Shaheen Afridi as his son-in-law and that he was stripped of T20 captaincy just before the World Cup started.
The Pakistani cricket team has come under fire after losing back-to-back matches to USA and India thus putting themselves in danger of missing out on Super Eight qualification. For them to qualify now they need to win big over Canada and Ireland while hoping for an Indian defeat against USA as well as loss by Irishmen against Americans alongside other factors depending on net run rate.