Is this an England choke or a power-packed Pakistani performance?

[vandokkum]

Couldn't have said it better myself.

Just one question tho, how is England a mentally weak team? They've consistently won in the past.

Consistently won what? England have never won the world cup or Champions trophy in their entire history.

 

[thehub]

England were nervous. New to icc knockout games. It's expected. Pitch was dry which helped pak spinners.

 

[jnaveen1980]

England's lack of adaptability. Good batsmen would have immediately identified the nature of the pitch and adapted accordingly. They were like deer caught in headlights going nowhere. Didn't have many options against spin attack other than sweep or reverse sweep. No deft touches to rotate strike. Complete brain freeze given the experience, form of their batsmen.

 

[Pollack]

Combination of England's lack of strategy and Pakistan's brilliant bowling.

 

[Bilal7]

Couldn't have said it better myself.

Just one question tho, how is England a mentally weak team? They've consistently won in the past.

No, they've never consistently won when under pressure. There are only a couple of mentally strong English cricketers, namely Stokes and Moeen Ali, perhaps Root as well. When the going gets tough only these three have the ability to fight back. The rest of the team just folds.

 

[DHONI183]

I thought it was a combination of both. The Pakistan bowlers never quite let them dominate and allow the regular boundary ball, and in return the England batsmen weren´t really ready to play according to what the situation demanded.

By the way, the below are my poetic words about England, once before the tournament and twice ahead of the semi-finals....

.... England are red hot favourites. Boy, what a batting line-up they´ve! And it doesn´t end there, they´ve plenty of all-round options (the likes of Stokes, Moeen, Rashid, Willey etc. give them such a clear advantage over other teams) and a good bowling attack too.

However, however, the problem with such explosive, T20-styled batting line-ups is that they´re very prone to collapses, especially in big matches and under pressure. For a team to win a world event, there´ll be, it has to be and it´s a must that at least once or twice there´ll be an occasion where early wickets will fall or a mini-collapse might happen mid-way the innings, and it´s there when your batsmen will be required to compromise on their style of play and be a bit circumspect. If they don´t do that, you´re bowled out for under 200 and your tournament is done there and then. This is a concern that I´ve more about England (for the kind of one-dimensional batting approach that they´ve adopted) and South Africa (for almost the same reason as England but add to it their habit of collapsing like a house of cards in world events) than about Australia, but it applies to them too.....

^ http://www.pakpassion.net/ppforum/s...e-2017-Champions-Trophy&p=9261165#post9261165 ^

I´ve been asking myself throughout the tournament as to which team it´ll be that can even attempt to beat this England team, especially their incredibly destructive batting line-up. Australia was one, definitely, but they´ve been pushed aside like nobodies. I can´t see any of the remaining teams being capable of beating them, with South Africa having perhaps a slight chance with the hitters that they posses in the like of de Kock, de Villiers, Miller and Morris - they can only play them in the final though, which´s still some way to go.

The only team that can beat England is their own destructive batting itself, because there´s a very thin line between "destructive" and "Self-destructive". The best bet against them could be them batting first and their batsmen getting greedy for a 360-370+ plus total and in return collapsing for a 310 or 320 - yes, collapsing to that kind of a score. Sometimes it can get worse for them as they end up collapsing for around 200 or just above. In any case, my point is, if they chase and have a total to set their sight on, you can forget defending that, literally. England´s only chance of a downfall could be them not knowing which total to set.....

^ http://www.pakpassion.net/ppforum/s...st-any-sticky-position!&p=9300092#post9300092 ^

I must add here something that, although I consider their batting line-up capable of chasing anything within the range of 340, what happened against Australia is not going to happen everyday, I mean the way they gunned down a competitive total despite the early collapse. Something like that will be hard to replicate in a must-win situation. As much as Morgan and the think-tank preach about sticking to the attacking style of play, the pressure comes automatically in a knockout game. Early wickets will make them double-minded and even if they still stick to their gains, there will be jitters in its execution.

^ http://www.pakpassion.net/ppforum/s...st-any-sticky-position!&p=9304498#post9304498 ^

There you go!