Sharjah: Sikandar Raza, the Pakistan-born Zimbabwe all-rounder and Karachi Kings‘ star player feels that his team’s two successive defeats will not affect the morale of the team.
When asked whether Karachi is only strong on paper and not on the field following defeats to Lahore Qalandars and Multan Sultans, Raza said: “It is too early to be saying that we are only good on paper and that we are not performing. The defeats certainly hurt us. T20 cricket itself is so funny that once you get on a roll it will not be difficult. For me it doesn’t matter how you start, but certainly it matters a lot how you finish. I hope we can find ourselves in a position where we can win three or four games in a row and then we have the combination to keep going. You are right, we are very strong on paper and I believe we are very strong out there as well. Two losses must not take away the fact that we are a strong team.”
Raza, through his accurate off spin, had struck twice to destroy Peshawar’s start before Imam-ul-Haq and Liam Dawson joined to give a challenging total. “I feel we bowled well. I think, batting first it was easy with the ball coming onto the bat. It was difficult to bat in the second innings because the ball began to skid and started to keep low. Since we bowled well and it was not a big total, we were pretty confident to reach there.”
Raza admitted that he should have contributed more and ensure the victory. “I’m not a guy who likes to blame over things which I cannot control. There was a time when I should have up the ante, I tried but I failed. There are a few lessons to learn here,” he said.
Brief scores
Peshawar Zalmi 153-8: Imam-ul-Haq 56, Dawson 43, Sammy 24n.o; Shinwari 2- 36, Sikandar Raza 2-23
Karachi Kings 109-9: Ingram 21, Imad 26, Rizwan 32 n.o; Hasan 4-15
