LONDON, (Reuters) – Pakistan leg-spinner Shahid Afridi destroyed the Netherlands’ Twenty20 World Cup dreams at Lord’s yesterday with four for 11 from his four overs in the final group B match.
The Netherlands, who needed to score at least 151 to advance to the Super Eight stage at the expense of their opponents, tumbled to 93 all out from 17.3 overs, losing by 82 runs.
They had needed to get to within 25 of Pakistan’s 175 for five to advance to the second round with England by virtue of their superior run rate after upsetting the tournament hosts last Friday.
The first six Pakistan batsmen all reached double figures with wicketkeeper Kamran Akmal, promoted to opener in a bid to accelerate the scoring rate, top-scoring with 41 from 30 balls with three sixes.
In reply, the Netherlands reached 42 for one before the Pakistan spinners, headed by Afridi, took control.
Afridi, whose faster delivery confounded all the Dutch batsmen, bowled Bas Zuiderent with his first ball.
He went on to record the fourth-best figures in all Twenty20 cricket while off-spinner Saeed Ajmal took three for 20 and Akmal finished with four stumpings.
The only blot on Pakistan’s day was their fallible fielding.
After the team had dropped four catches in their 48-run loss to England on Sunday, Shoaib Malik allowed a chance to slip through his fingertips in the gully and Salman Butt dropped a simple chance at short fine-leg.
