They did start well but couldn't really carry the momentum against South Africa's disciplined bowling line-up which kept on taking wickets at regular intervals.
After losing opener Imam Ul Haq (12) and Abdullah Shafigue (9) cheaply, skipper Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan came to Pakistan's rescue and notched a 48-run partnership together to instill hopes amongs Pakistani supporters. But their collaboration didn't last long and was cut short by Gerald Coetzee who snared the prized wicket of Rizwan at the score of 31. Babar too followed the suit and returned to pavilion right after recording his third fifty in the tournament to leave Pakistan reeling again at 141/5. The momentum shifted slightly in favor of Pakistan again when Saud Shakeel and Shadab Khan stepped up to the crease. Shakeel's dynamic half-century off 50 balls and Shadab's 43 runs breathed life back into the innings and steered Pakistan past 200-run mark.
But South African bowlers struck back, especially Tabraiz Shamsi who took a brilliant four-fer, and Pakistan lost their last five wickets for mere 45 runs and ended up posting a not-so-impressive total of 270.
Ramiz Raja lashes out at Pakistan's weakness
Meanwhile, former PCB chairman Ramiz Raja during an interaction with Star Sports pointed out Pakistan's weakness against South Africa.
"It's not going to be simple because it's not that kind of a track where you can track down South Africa, the mighty batting power of South Africa, and they've got themselves to be blamed, Pakistan, because there was very little game awareness," Raja told Star Sports
"They didn't understand the value of keeping wickets in hand because that's how they operate generally in ODI cricket. But here I think maybe there was a stage fright," he added
Drawing attention to the recent string of losses faced by Pakistan, he said “Maybe the three losses, yeah, is got them thinking differently. And it was batting in the last part of the innings because in ODIs you look for little phases where you can make a comeback and you can absolutely destroy the good work done up front in the first 25 overs. And we saw that the last part of the innings was absolutely badly done by Pakistan.”
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