T20 World Cup: Pakistan coach Gary Kirsten identifies where they went wrong vs India, refuses to blame pitch

Pakistan have twice now come close to winning a match at the T20 World Cup. And on both instances they fell short and remain winless in the competition.

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The first was in the Super Over against USA when the 19-run target proved far too much for Babar Azam and Co. And on Sunday, the 119-run target was too difficult to scale for the Men in Green.

The fine margins have cost Gary Kirsten-coached team and the former South Africa batter accepted that they were to blame for both losses.

“(We) let it slip at the end,” Kirsten admitted, after Pakistan’s ‘disappointing’ six-run loss to India in New York.

“Some maybe not-so-great decision making when you’ve got the game on, it’s (at) a run-a-ball, eight wickets in hand, (it was) decision making at that point and that’s the game. I think we had the game at 76/2, with six or seven overs left at that point, so (it’s) disappointing not to get across the line from the position we got ourselves into.”

Kirsten said the Pakistan support staff will be ‘looking into the issues’, as they attempt to get on the board against Canada on 12 June.

“We probably gave away 10 or 15 runs at the end that we shouldn’t have,” Kirsten continued.

“Those small, little attention to details can make a massive difference. We had that game for 35 of the 40 overs.”

Pakistan need to win both their remaining Group A matches to stand any chance of reaching the Super 8s. Yet, it may not be enough if other results don’t go their way.

“We’ve still got a chance in the tournament. We’re still hopeful that things can play (into) our hands. We’ve got to play a lot better cricket than what we are playing," Kirsten said.

Kirsten defended the playing surface at New York’s T20 Cricket World Cup venue.

All five games at the Nassau County International Cricket Stadium, which features a drop-in square, laid a month before the tournament, have been low-scoring affairs.

There had been criticism of the surface after India’s win over Ireland last week with former Zimbabwe international and ex-England team director Andy Flower calling it “dangerous” because of the uneven bounce.

But Sunday’s wicket, while hard to score on, provided only the occasional ball which ‘popped’ off a length and Kirsten said it had made for an interesting game.

“I think it wasn’t dangerous, I mean the odd one rose up, but not many. Generally it kept a little bit lower, it was difficult to score from both batting sides and also a fairly slow outfield so it was never going to be a big total,” said Kirsten.

“I would have said 140 would have been a really good score on that pitch, so India didn’t get that and so I thought we had the game,” added the South African.

Kirsten said that while boundaries had been at a premium, unusually for the big-hitting T20 format, that simply made for a different kind of contest.

“We knew it was going to be tight, but you know sometimes it’s fun seeing games like that as well, it’s not always about sixes and hitting, getting 260 and 240’s, you can actually have a really entertaining game on a 120 chase, so I don’t think it’s bad for the game,” he said.

Last week’s complaints led the International Cricket Council (ICC) to accept that the wickets hadn’t been up to standards for the opening games at the venue.

Three games remain at the venue with the last coming on Wednesday when India face co-hosts USA.