Many former Pakistani players have questioned India's performance in the game against England in the 2019 World Cup. The reason for the accusations being that, India's loss led to Pakistan getting out of the tournament.
Many former Pakistani players have questioned India's performance in the game against England in the 2019 World Cup. The reason for the accusations being that, India's loss led to Pakistan getting out of the tournament.
Pakistan all-rounder Mohammad Hafeez to has said that according to him, India did not have the intent to win the match against England. However, Hafeez also added that the match between India-England cannot be singled out as the main reason for Pakistan getting knocked out.
"If you show that match to any cricket fan 100 times, the fan would take only one result from that game, the intent to play with the spirit was not there, I do not know how much that result affected anyone, Pakistan team was not eliminated from the tournament on the basis of India-England match," Hafeez told reporters in a virtual press conference.
"We played well in the 2019 World Cup but we were eliminated because of our mistakes only. I do not blame anyone else for our failure. We should not think that we bowed out of the tournament on the basis of one other result," he added.
The debate regarding India's performance against England came out after England all-rounder Ben Stokes questioned the Men in Blue's intent in his book titled 'On Fire'.
In his book, Stokes mentioned that he was surprised by India's intent in the group-stage match. However, he nowhere suggested that India lost deliberately.
"I watched that entire match Ben Stokes talked about in his book, why did he write that only he can tell you about that, but according to me there was no intent for winning the match," Hafeez concluded on the matter.
In the round-robin stage match against England in Birmingham in the 2019 World Cup, India failed to chase down the massive target of 338 and fell short by 31 runs.
That was the only game India lost in the group stage last year before the semifinal loss against New Zealand. India's chasing approach was criticised by many, and the main to be accused was wicketkeeper-batsman MS Dhoni.
As soon as Stokes mentioned Dhoni's lack of intent in his book, Pakistan fans started saying that India deliberately lost the match to knock arch-rivals. However, Stokes clarified that he never said India lost deliberately.
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 "Mohammad Hafeez talks about India-England match in 2019 WC")
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