Babar and I were ready, we should have finished the game: Imam-Ul-Haq

Pakistan starter Imam-Ul-Haq and his captain Babar Azam sailed from their second wicket position, eclipsing South Africa 273-6 in the series opening ODI. The partnership was worth 177 runs when Anrich Nortje found a way to break through, against the run. In fact, he did it twice in the space of two overs to fire both hitters from the set (Imam 70, Azam 103) to push Pakistan into nervous territory and give South Africa an outside chance for a late heist.

Pakistan went from 186 for 1 to 203 for 5, like a family history of complicating life in what otherwise should have been a simple persecution. Ramiz Raja, in the comments, saw the funny side of events and considered that that was the reason his team was so in demand: they were entertainers from start to finish.

Having finally won the game, outside of the final ball, Imam also saw the funny side. “You know this pandemic is taking everyone down these days, so we thought we’d entertain people a bit,” he joked.

But the starter admitted that his and Azam’s inability to maintain their position and conclude the chase was worrisome for a team hoping to rise up and have a chance to win a big tournament in the next few years.

“On a serious note, if you want to win big tournaments and become one of the top three teams … it’s not that we don’t talk about this in our meetings, it is argued, that if your top three go white -ball, then on other teams they don’t just make 100, they get 150.

“That is what we are trying to do, like Babar [Azam] and it was ready today, we should finish the game. We were playing an ODI after a long time. We want to learn from our mistakes and turn these 70s and 80s into match winning shots and turn a win like this into a seven or six wicket victory. ”

Since scoring a century against Bangladesh at Lord’s in the 2019 World Cup, Imam has appeared in just four ODIs as of Friday’s match, and he was eager to start from the beginning and have him boast a triple-figure score.

“To be honest, I am very disappointed [in not finishing the game]”Imam said.” I’ve been waiting a year and a half since my last hundred. I haven’t had so many opportunities in the last year. You don’t always get what you want, but I have two more games to make up for it, “he said.

Meanwhile, Azam went ahead with his 13th century in the 50-and-over format, and he was glad he did, even though his departure put pressure on Pakistan in the later stages of the persecution. The Pakistani skipper praised the sixth-field partnership between Mohammad Rizwan and Shadab Khan worth 53 runs that kept the visitors in hot pursuit.

“I quite enjoyed those hundred,” said Azam. “With Imam, the plan was to just extend that partnership as far towards the goal as possible. We just didn’t want to lose focus at any point. We wanted to finish it, but unfortunately, I got out, then Imam did it and we had a bit of a crash that put pressure on us. But Rizi and Shadab really had an outstanding partnership that got us back in the game. ”