Champions Trophy 2017 | Hasan Ali: Learnt a lot from my bad performance against India

The Indian batsmen bashed the woeful Pakistani bowling to all parts of the ground and posted a monstrous 319 for them to chase in their encounter on June 4th. Wahab Riaz was the chief culprit as Riaz conceded 87 runs off 8.4 overs to be credited with the record of giving the most runs away in an innings. However, youngster Hasan Ali was not far behind as the 23-year old gave away 70 runs in his course of 10 overs due to his undisciplined line and length. The right-arm pacer admitted that the anticipation and the huge hopes that the players bear before any India-Pakistan match was one of the reasons his side slumped to defeat

"Matches played against India are always special for both sets of players, but I don't think it was that much of a matter of nerves for myself. I am, however, disappointed that the last two-three overs I bowled in that match did not go according to plan. It was a tough lesson for me, but I learnt a lot from it and it will stand me in good stead in future. Sometimes you learn more from a bad performance than a good one," he said.

The hyped India vs Pakistan game was overwhelmingly dominated by the Indian side who scripted a dream start to their title defence by defeating their fiercest rivals by a huge margin of 124-runs. Pakistan, once again, felt the burn of suffering yet another loss at the hands of India in an ICC event.

"Yes, the loss to India in the first game was tough to take for all of us, but we had a good and open discussion about our failings and we planned our approach for the next game with great care. All I did in the match against South Africa was to play according to the plan provided by our coach and captain. The plan was simply to bowl stump to stump and that seemed to work very well for me." Hasan Ali said.

Apart from the lacklustre bowling display, the Pakistani side was sloppy on the field which resulted in two dropped catches and multiple misfields that helped India to take the score beyond 300. It was Hasan Ali who dropped Yuvraj Singh at 8 who then went on to play a blistering 53-run knock. However, the Pakistani side's efforts in the outfield were in stark contrast to their woeful fielding against India and Ali this time took a great running catch to send Kagiso Rabada packing.

"The catch I dropped of Yuvraj Singh caused damage to our chances and also was very disappointing for me as well. I take great pride in my fielding and that dropped catch of Yuvraj proved very costly. But today, I wanted to make amends for that poor fielding effort against India as not only was I determined to stay focused on my bowling but also wanted to make sure I was spot on with my fielding as well. My celebration after the Rabada catch was pretty heartfelt but was more in response to the abuse I was getting from some spectators in the stands.", Ali explained.

Following the win against South Africa, Pakistan now has the chance to seal a semi-final berth if they defeat Sri Lanka in their next encounter on Monday. However, Pakistan's all-around performance against South Africa has helped boost the morale of the team and Ali revealed that the team is all pumped up to take on their Asian rivals.

"When we had claimed the first three-four wickets so quickly we felt that we had the better of South Africa and their morale was affected. We were very confident especially after AB de Villiers was out first ball. It was then a matter of time that we could claim the rest of the wickets or restrict the South Africans to a lowish score, as our tails were up. It was a tremendous effort by the team and we are all pumped up for the next game against Sri Lanka", Ali concluded.