ICC World Twenty20 Super Eights: NZ Whimper Against Pakistan’s Gul

New Zealand would not believe what hit them when they surrendered tamely to rip roaring Pakistan team in their Super Eights match of the ICC World Twenty20 in England.
New Zealand found themselves right in the middle of a hurricane and when it finally departed, their team was torn to shreads. The hurricane went by the name of Umar Gul and the credit must go to Younis Khan, the Pakistan captain, for deliberately using Gul rather late in the innings, where he extracted prodigious reverse swing to topple the might, or whatever there was of the New Zealand team.
A team with a topsy-turvy record left no one in doubt about who had emerged victories. Pakistan woke up from their slumber to pose arguably the strongest performance of the tournament, completely annihilating their opponents, who are not lame ducks either.
One can judge by the horrific time the New Zealand team had at the crease given that Scott Styris topped the scorecard with twenty-two. New Zealand struggled with Umar Gul’s reverse swing as the tournament’s top wicket taker disintegrated virtually single handedly the entire opposition line up with his five wicket haul. Abdul Razzaq’s return was also a handy reprieve for the struggling Pakistan team as he picked up two wickets post his absence due to ICL.
With just ninety-nine runs on board, New Zealand and their captain Daniel Vettori had to depend heavily on a miracle, one that never came. After Shahzaib Hasan and Kamran Akmal’s start, the next best innings came from Shahid Afridi whose twenty-nine was sufficient as was Hasan’s thirty-five to complete the riot for New Zealand, and send them into a die or die situation with Sri Lanka in their final Super Eight match. Pakistan are through to the semi final stage.

To catch all the matches of the ICC World Twenty20 in England, begin with

ICC World Twenty20: India Clobber Ireland

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