England captain Moeen Ali was disappointed after they could not chase down 146 runs in the fifth T20I at the Gaddafi Stadium, Lahore on Wednesday. The visitors lost three wickets in the PowerPlay overs as they could not get going in the run chase.
The tourists kept losing wickets at regular intervals and could not chase down the below-par score. Moeen Ali top-scored for the team with an unbeaten knock of 51 runs from 37 balls but the England skipper didn’t get the support from the other end.
“I feel that out of all the games, it was the most disappointing one with the way we batted in particular. Of course, we want to play the attacking brand of cricket, but you also have to see the situation of the game and the conditions. Today, all we needed was partnership. Had we put up a 60-70 run partnership, we would have won the game,” Moeen said in the post-match presser.
Dawid Malan scored 36 runs for England but they weren’t able to stay ahead in the end. On the other hand, Mohammad Rizwan top-scored for Pakistan with 63 runs from 46 balls and Ali believes England can learn a lot from him. Rizwan has been performing consistently for Pakistan and he is currently the number one T20I batter.
“He is a brilliant player and is hard to stop. He is very busy and hits boundaries in awkward positions. He is somebody we can learn a lot from. He saw the situation and adapted to the wicket and has been free-flowing all the time. He took the risks when he needed to and played properly. We have found him quite difficult to bowl to so far,” Moeen added.
Ali added that they struggled to get going against the Pakistan spinners in the middle overs. The Pakistan spin duo of Shadab Khan and Iftikhar Ahmed conceded only 41 runs in the eight overs they bowled collectively.
Ali said in the post-match presentation, “Very good game, disappointed. We are a better team than that. We struggled in the middle, with their spinners who bowled well. We knew it was hard for the bowlers to control with the dew and overnight rain, we needed to hang in there and go hard at the end.”
Ali also showered praise on Mark Wood, who took three wickets for 20 runs, as he said, “He’s amazing. On a real slow wicket, he bowled fast. He is massive for our team. He gets the big wickets and he’s been awesome in the two games he has played for us.”
