“What happened to Cricket in Pakistan”: Former England cricket Player Kevin Petersen remarks after Pak loses Test match against Bangladesh

Sunday was witness to a horrific day for Pakistani cricket fans as Bangladesh defeated the Pakistani Test team on their home soil at the Rawalpindi Cricket Stadium by 10 wickets after setting a target of a meagre 30 runs. 

Since the Pak team has started to play in their home grounds, they have managed to win only against South Africa. The other tests, they have either drawn or lost the series. Regarding this situation, former England all rounder, Kevin Peterson took to X (formerly twitter) and said, “What happened to cricket in Pakistan? When I played the PSL, the players had a very good work ethic and the youngsters on display were magic.” he asked, “What’s happening there?”

The Match;

Captained by Najmul Shanto, Bangladesh beat the hosts by 10 wickets. Opting to field first at the toss, Bangladesh had started the Test on a high as they plucked the top order and reduced the Pak side at a mere 16 for 3 wickets down on the opening day.

However the Shaan Masood led team’s middle order batters, Saud Shakeel (141) and Pak star wicketkeeper batsman Mohammed Rizwan (171) kept the match going on for their team resulting in a huge total of 448/6 after which the innings was declared. 

Going all guns blazing Pak started to go with an all pace attack while fielding and this has taken place for the first time in 28 years. But it proved to be fatal as Bangladesh put up 565 in the first innings getting a lead of 117 runs. Bangladesh wicketkeeper veteran Mushfiqur Rahim struck a well balanced 191 runs off 341 balls while backed by able fifties from Mehdy Hassan who scored 77 and Shadman Islam scoring 93 runs respectively.

On day 5, in the second innings, Pak suffered a fatal collapse from Day 4’s overnight total of 23/1 wicket. Half of the team were bundled out for a score of 104 in the board before spinners Shakib al Hassan and Mehdy Hassan formed a dreadful partnership smashing off 7 wickets comprising middle orders and the tail enders comprising bowlers for 146 runs. After that Bangladesh openers Islam and Zakir Hasan scored the winning 30 odd runs within 7 overs.