![\"Gulbadin](\"https:\/\/indiansportsnews.co.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Gulbadin_Naib.jpg\")
Afghanistan captain Gulbadin Naib was keen to stress the positives from his side\u2019s performance after suffering a seven-wicket defeat to Australia at the Bristol County Ground.<\/p>\nAfghanistan captain Gulbadin Naib was keen to stress the positives from his side\u2019s performance after suffering a seven-wicket defeat to Australia at the Bristol County Ground.<\/p>\n
A half-century from Najibullah Zadran helped the Afghans recover from the worst possible start, in which they lost both of their openers for ducks, to post a target of 208.<\/p>\n
But David Warner hit an unbeaten 89 to guide the reigning champions to a comfortable victory after Australia skipper Aaron Finch set the tone with an explosive 66 off 49 balls.<\/p>\n
And despite admitting that Afghanistan\u2019s total was sub-par, Gulbadin was encouraged by the way his side fought back and showed that they can live with the best teams in the world.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is a low score on this kind of surface and if you batted faster, you should be 250 or 270-plus runs on this kind of surface against Australia or any other team,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can’t give them any chances [to take wickets], so this is why we slightly missed out on some runs. If you look at the start of the innings, we lost two wickets in two overs.<\/p>\n
\u201c[Mohammad] Shahzad and Hazratullah [Zazai] didn’t bat well and also in the middle we struggled.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe thought positive things in the middle and me and Zadran were able to make a 90-run partnership.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe thought we could score 200, 250 plus, but credit goes to the Australian side, they bowled really well. When you face [Mitchell] Starc and [Pat] Cummins, it’s quite quick.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe can play against these kind of teams, so you should take positive things from them, they can’t give you any single chance of mistakes. Obviously, we have a tough match upcoming.\u201d<\/p>\n
Shahzad and Hazratullah lost their wickets without scoring a run in the first two overs after Afghanistan, who face Sri Lanka in Cardiff in their next game on Tuesday, decided to bat first.<\/p>\n
Further wickets fell as Afghanistan found themselves 77\/5 before skipper Gulbadin (31) and Najibullah (51) mounted a recovery to guide their side to 160\/5 in Bristol.<\/p>\n
A late cameo from Rashid Khan (27) ensured the lowest ranked team in the tournament passed 200 as Cummins (3-40) and Adam Zampa (3-60) were the pick of the Aussie bowlers.<\/p>\n
Finch and Warner made easy work of the chase, though, as Australia reached the target within 35 overs for their ninth consecutive ODI victory and a perfect start to their defence.<\/p>\n
But while the result did not go their way, Afghanistan showed enough to suggest they can upset a few sides in this tournament \u2013 especially with their passionate support behind them.<\/p>\n
Gulbadin continued: \u201cEvery team, especially for us, is a tough team, so we are just waiting for our turn. You know this type of team doesn\u2019t give you a single chance.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut they are coming really hard and harder how they did in this game. We look and we just take a positive thing from the performance and go for the next day.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously, if you have this kind of audience and they are supporting you and you know your side, so the difficulty you have \u2013 you take a lot of positive things from the crowd.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo the crowd and all support for Afghanistan, and there was a huge number of Afghans in the crowd, gave us a lot of energy on the ground for the boys.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Afghanistan captain Gulbadin Naib was keen to stress the positives from his side\u2019s performance after suffering a seven-wicket defeat to Australia at the Bristol County Ground.<\/p>\n
A half-century from Najibullah Zadran helped the Afghans recover from the worst possible start, in which they lost both of their openers for ducks, to post a target of 208.<\/p>\n
But David Warner hit an unbeaten 89 to guide the reigning champions to a comfortable victory after Australia skipper Aaron Finch set the tone with an explosive 66 off 49 balls.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36736,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36737","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket-cricket"],"yoast_head":"\n