PCB to felicitate Pakistan's T20 World Cup squad for making it to the final of the tournament

The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) has decided to felicitate the members of the national cricket team who finished as the runners-up of the ICC T20 World Cup 2022 in Australia. The Pakistani bowlers bowled their hearts out while defending 137 at the MCG against England, but star all-rounder Ben Stokes had the last laugh on the day that mattered the most.

Meanwhile, it has also been learnt that the players will be felicitated for making the finals of this year’s Asia Cup where they went down to Sri Lanka by 23 runs in Dubai. A grand reception for the players will reportedly be organized in the national capital of Islamabad.

The purpose is to honour and appreciate the players: PCB Source

"The purpose is to honour and appreciate the players for their performances in two major tournaments," a source in the Pakistan Cricket Board said as quoted as saying by NDTV.

"Ramiz (Raja) appreciated the fact that the team made two major finals but also noted that the players still had to improve in some areas to match the best in all formats," the source said.

At the same time, the source also added that the players could get monetary rewards having made the finals of two major tournaments this year. Furthermore, the source mentioned that Babar Azam’s captaincy is not in jeopardy as of now as the PCB Chairman Ramiz Raja has assured to back him.

While bowling was Pakistan’s strength in both multi-nation tournaments, it was their batting that let them down and unfortunately for them, their fragile middle-order was badly exposed in the finals of the Asia Cup and T20 World Cup.

Chasing a manageable 171 in the Asia Cup final against Sri Lanka, only Mohammad Rizwan was the lone warrior with the bat scoring 55 runs off 49 deliveries. However, once he was dismissed in the 17th over, the Pakistani batting suffered a dramatic collapse soon after.

In the T20 World Cup final against the Three Lions, Babar Azam and Rizwan could not replicate their stupendous semifinal performances and were dismissed just when Pakistani batting needed acceleration.