Babar Azam‘s decision to give Mohammad Nawaz the ball ahead of Usama Mir for the 48th over of South Africa’s run-chase in Chennai on October 27 has received a lot of flak – but that is because the outcome did not go Pakistan’s way, not because the move was without merit.

With five runs needed to win in three overs and just one wicket left to play with for South Africa, Babar Azam had a tough choice to make. In an attempt to finish the game before it reached this point, he had bowled out all three of his seamers by the 47th over. The only options he had remaining were the left-arm spin of Mohammad Nawaz, the leg-spin of Usama Mir, and the off-spin of Iftikhar Ahmed. Babar chose to go with Nawaz.

How it turned out was for everyone to see. Keshav Maharaj got a short ball on the pads, exactly what Pakistan didn’t need at that stage, hit it for a boundary to seal an epic victory for South Africa, and celebrated wildly, understandably so.

Equally understandable was the meltdown that followed in the Pakistan cricket fraternity. They had , after all, squandered a golden opportunity to take down one of the strongest teams in the 2023 World Cup and keep their chances of qualifying for the semi-finals realistically alive.

Wasim Akram said after the game that Mir should have got the 48th over ahead of Nawaz, since the former had picked two wickets, of Rassie van der Dussen and Aiden Markram, and had gone for fewer runs than Nawaz (economy of 5.62 compared to 5.83 before the start of the 48th over).

Wasim Akram says Babar Azam should have given last over to Usama Mir instead Mohammad Nawaz because Usama was bowling really well. #CWC23 pic.twitter.com/9hhplo2aPn

— Arfa Feroz Zake (@ArfaSays_) October 27, 2023

Virender Sehwag had the same opinion.

Virender Sehwag says Babar made a wrong decision – “I was thinking Babar will give last over to Usama Mir. He took wickets and conceded less runs. Babar made a wrong call by giving last over to Nawaz. Pakistan should have won this match. They gifted match to SouthAfrica.” #CWC23 pic.twitter.com/ciCz45kvTE

— Arfa Feroz Zake (@ArfaSays_) October 28, 2023

Would Mir have been able to defend the five runs that Pakistan had to play with? We’ll never know, but would he have had a better chance to do so than Nawaz? If you detach yourself from the immediate aftermath of the result and look at it just more deeply, you’d realise perhaps not.

A certain degree of variability is expected from a wrist spinner. As the old adage goes, sometimes a long hop and a full toss are a wrist spinner’s biggest wicket-taking weapons, referencing their inherent tendency to miss their lengths more than finger-spinners do. And Mir has shown a proclivity to bowl a decent number of them in his short career so far, perhaps even more than the average leg spinner at this level.

In his eight-over spell yesterday, Mir bowled five full-tosses. Luckily for him and Pakistan, only one of them went for a six, as batters either found fielders or missed out due to premeditated reverse sweeps on the other four.

With just four runs to defend in the end, Pakistan couldn’t afford a single loose ball. That Nawaz bowled one, if not two, was unfortunate, and something no one could have predicted. However, the decision of whom to give the ball to should have been taken based on who had the lowest probability to do so, by design and by recent form. And Nawaz, clearly, was the right choice.

Keep in mind, Mir had come in as a concussion substitute for Shadab Khan, who had walked off injured during the first over of the South African innings. For someone who wasn’t trusted enough to be in the first XI to suddenly be given the ball over a more experienced player who had been in such situations before would have been asking for too much.

Poor tactics didn’t help Nawaz or Pakistan as No.11 Shamsi was allowed an open field to nudge the first ball of the over for a single and give the strike to Maharaj, a man with five Test fifties. Now that was a mistake by Babar. Picking Nawaz to bowl the 48th over before Mir was not.

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