Shahid Afridi turned 34 on March 1, but he didn’t celebrate his birthday as he was running through a bad patch with the bat. It was learnt he said he would celebrate it once he gets some runs and he couldn’t have found a better way. It was his unbeaten 34 from 18 balls that enabled Pakistan to win their crucial Asia Cup encounter against India.
Afridi came in when Pakistan was 46 runs away from victory and lost Shoaib Maqsood to a silly run-out inside the next seven deliveries which brought Umar Gul to the middle. Afridi, however, showed little panic as he always does and applied some sense in to his batting. He took 12 off Jadeja’s last over with a six and a four in it.
Pakistan needed nine off the last four balls when Afridi took off, and took off in some style by hitting Ashwin for back-to-back sixes to land the win and soon followed the trademark celebration.
