Cricket legend Sunil Gavaskar cut the Pakistan cricket team down to size on Sunday after the Indian cricket team defeated them by seven wickets in their Asia Cup group stage encounter at the Dubai International Stadium in UAE. Gavaskar said that the Pakistan team looked like a “Popatwadi team” rather than a national cricket team.
Gavaskar’s comments came after the Pakistan cricket team managed to limp its way to a modest 127/9 batting first at Dubai. In return, the Indian team, led by captain Suryakumar Yadav’s unbeaten 47 and handy contributions from Abhishek Sharma (31) and Tilak Verma (31), chased down the target with 25 balls to spare.
Only spinner Saim Ayub managed to get wickets for Pakistan in the game. In the build up to the game, Pakistan legend Wasim Akram too had spoken about how ajeeb–strange–the Pakistan team XI was looking for the game against India considering they had picked just one pacer, Shaheen Shah Afridi, in the side.
Gavaskar went a step ahead after India’s comfortable victory.
“This did not look like the Pakistan cricket team to me. It looked more like a Popatwadi team,” Gavaskar said on Sony Sports Network after the match.
In Mumbai cricket slang, Popatwadi team is a phrase used for a weak team. In Mumbai cricketing circles, the phrase Popatwadi team was popularised by many legends of yore like Dilip Sardesai, who is said to have branded many weak bowling attacks as ‘Popatwadi’ attacks.
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Gavaskar added: “I have followed the Pakistan cricket team for decades. One of my earliest cricketing memories is running from Churchgate station to the Wankhede Stadium to watch the legendary Hanif Mohammad play. This is not the same team. I don’t think they will be able to challenge other teams too much,” Gavaskar added.
When asked which teams India needed to be wary of if not Pakistan, Gavaskar named Sri Lanka and Afghanistan.
“Sri Lanka have pace and spin and Afghanistan are a very unpredictable team with players like Rashid Khan in the side. So those are the two teams India must watch out for,” he said.
This is not the first time that Gavaskar has used the phrase to describe a cricket team: he had used the turn of phrase against the Royal Challengers Bengaluru side also in the 2016 IPL season.
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