Bharath Ramaraj in Dubai
“First of all, this is not our responsibility or our work,” Muhammad Waseem, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) skipper said after the completion of their Asia Cup encounter against Pakistan. “We were focusing on our game. We came here to play the game, and we did that.”
The UAE skipper’s answer about Pakistan’s players not arriving at the ground at the scheduled time was short but concise. Amid all the question marks about Andy Pycroft’s continuation as the match referee in the 2025 Asia Cup, and whether Pakistan would boycott the tournament, one couldn’t help but feel sorry for the UAE players. Their players had to wait for more than 90 minutes at the venue for the match to commence. That too with none of it being their fault.
Despite all that happened off the field, the UAE put on a spirited display with the ball in hand. Junaid Siddique found swing in the air and extracted nip off the wicket to take three wickets. Simranjeet Singh flighted the ball and used the longer leg-side boundary, while bowling to the left-handers, to good effect and finished with creditable figures of 3 for 26. Their fielding too in ‘the ring of fire’ was very good to excellent.
Unfortunately, while chasing a competitive target in rather tricky conditions, they crumbled under pressure. Waseem, Alishan Sharafu and Asif Khan – some of the mainstays of the batting unit – couldn’t click on UAE’s big day. The UAE side, though, will take heart from the tournament. Yes, the gulf in class between India and the UAE was clearly visible. But they comfortably beat Oman, and at one point of time, they had Pakistan in some trouble.
Incidentally, in the recent tri-series held in Sharjah, they did give both Pakistan and Afghanistan a scare or two. In one of the matches, Afghanistan emerged victorious by a mere four runs. In May this year, they stunned Bangladesh in a T20I series by a margin of 2-1. In 2023-24, they also gave Afghanistan a run for their money before losing 1-2. It also shouldn’t come as a surprise that they were the best team in the Asia Cup qualifiers. Next month, the UAE would be eyeing T20 World Cup qualification via the Asia–EAP Regional Final.
The UAE-Pakistan game would be remembered mostly for the wrong reasons. But lost somewhere in the off-field shenanigans was a tale of the UAE’s steady upward curve.
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