The Pakistani People love The Queen
The cricket T20 World Cup is upon us. The semi-finals are actually upon us and cricket fans are going mad with excitement at the prospect of both the upcoming matches. One country that is particularly going a bit loopy is Pakistan. The Pakistani cricket team was almost knocked out of the tournament and barely scraped through by the skin of their teeth. It was only because of England beating New Zealand that Pakistan is now in the semis.
Pakistan managed to survive to the semi finals, just like they did in the 1994 50 over World Cup, by beating South Africa and having a slightly higher run rate average than New Zealand. We are talking about the T20 World Champions here and these guys only just managed to survive being knocked out of the current tournament. What is interesting to note here is that once Pakistan knew they had beaten South Africa everyone on the team and in the country started to pray for England to beat New Zealand. It is funny that instead of playing soundly and beating everyone that came in their path, the team now resorted to praying and hoping and wishing that another team would beat their opponents so they could go through. Their hopes and dreams rested on another team’s performance.
England beat New Zealand soundly and the jubilation and excitement from Pakistan could be heard all over the world. Celebrations were held because Pakistan had gone through, and it was as if the team had not only made it to the semi-finals but had won the tournament again. All across the country the newspapers were splashed with some of the following headings; ‘We Pakistanis love England, Pakistan loves the Queen and God save the Queen’. What is so interesting about these headlines is the fact that the Queen had nothing to do with it. Did she bless the England team with a wave of a magic wand, or sprinkle some fairy dust on the team before they left proclaiming that they would do all in their power to help Pakistan make it through to the semi-finals by order of royal decree? I think not. It may turn out that the Queen isn’t even a cricket fan and she has better things to do with her time besides watching cricket, like roaming about in her massive gardens or tending to her loyal subjects.
Maybe the English T20 cricket team did have something to do with the Pakistani team making it to the semi-finals of the T20 World Cup, but the Queen certainly didn’t. If the Pakistanis had played a little better to begin with they wouldn’t have found the need to be professing their undying support and love for the Queen of England. Pakistanis have a tendency to attribute and project their successes and failures onto others and not take the blame for their own actions. They are quick to attribute success to themselves though and that too only some members of the team say it was because of their own fantastic bowling effort or their great batting that won the game for them.
The only way Pakistan can win this tournament is if they stopped playing as individuals and start playing as a team. They need to find that team spirit that is so lacking in the team. The biggest challenge facing the Pakistani team will be seen tomorrow when they face the mighty juggernauts that are Australia. There is very little chance that unless the team can come together as one, they won’t be able to beat the Australians. The Australian team has been unstoppable throughout the entire tournament and Pakistan seems like it will become just another statistic on Australia’s march to win the title in their maiden attempt in the T20 World Cup.
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