Pakistan wicketkeeper and opener Mohammad Rizwan has heaped rich praise on young pace spearhead Shaheen Shah Afridi after the Men in Green scripted a historic 10-wicket win over India in the ongoing ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2021 on Sunday (October 24) in Dubai.
Afridi returned with brilliant figures of 3/31 in his quota of 4 overs, taking the big fishes of India, KL Rahul (3), Rohit Sharma (0), and Virat Kohli (57), to completely change the course of the game.
The tall young pacer’s dangerous spell helped Pakistan restrict Team India to a below-par 151/7, which the Men in Green chased down inside 17 overs without losing a single wicket, with Babar Azam scoring a 52-ball 68* while Rizwan hitting a 55-ball 79*.
This was Pakistan’s maiden 10-wicket win in T20I format, while India’s first-ever loss by 10 wickets in T20Is.
It was Pakistan’s first victory over India in 6 T20 World Cup tournaments, while their first in both the T20 and ODI World Cups since 1992, and Rizwan credited Afridi for the memorable win over the Indians, saying this was a gift to the Pakistan people who had been waiting for this day for years.
Rizwan said after the match, “Shaheen got us wickets at the top of the order and that proved to be the turning point. Congratulations to the whole of Pakistan and all our people as we were all waiting for this win.”
He concluded, “This was my first game against India, so it’s a good thing for me. I used to watch all the Indo-Pak matches on television and used to pinpoint where we made mistakes. But today’s game was great and after Shaheen got those wickets we were confident we would win.”
