The Pakistan cricket team again won the hearts of their fans by defeating Afghanistan in a thrilling match Wednesday at the Sharjah cricket stadium in UAE. With this victory, Pakistan fixed its spot in the finals of the Asia Cup 2022.
Pakistan needed 11 runs off the last over to reach the target of 130-runs set by Afghanistan, which looked a little difficult due to the disciplined bowling by the opposition. However, Pakistan's Naseem Shah smashed two sixes of the first two deliveries of Fazalhaq Farooqi and won the match for his team by one wicket.
The nail biting game saw players' emotions run high as Pakistan's Asif Ali and Afghanistan's Fareed Ahmed dangerously came close to hitting one another. The incident took place in the 19th over of the match when Asif got out -- after hitting a six -- and Fareed celebrated in his face. Asif responded by telling him to stay away and even showed him the bat, as a warning.
The hard-hitting Pakistani batsman received criticism from players and fans for his behaviour on social media.
"This is stupidity at extreme level by Asif Ali and should be ban from the rest of the tournament, any bowler has the right to celebrate but being physical is not acceptable at all," said Shafiq Stanikzai, the former Chief Executive of the Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB) in a tweet.
The hashtags #PakvsAfg and #AsifAli are currently trending on the microblogging site Twitter. Following this occurrence, Afghanistan's cricket supporters have urged ICC (International Cricket Council), the sport's regulatory body, to take action against Pakistani batsman Asif Ali for his actions during Wednesday's Asia Cup match between Pakistan and Afghanistan.
"We request from @icc he should be banned from cricket Bcz it is the 2nd time he do bat like that against Afghan," said Aftab Alam, an Afghan player