After Pakistan's five-wicket loss to England in the final of the 2022 T20 World Cup, a Twitter spat broke between former Pakistan pacer Shoaib Akhtar and India fast bowler Mohammed Shami. After Pakistan failed to defeat a 137-run total in the title clash in Melbourne, Akhtar tweeted an emoticon of a heart-break. Then Shami, who was part of India's T20 World Cup squad, retweeted Akhtar's comment and said: "Sorry brother. It's call (sic) karma". The tweet went viral within minutes. Then, Akhtar also responded to the tweet.
"And this what you call sensible tweet.." Akhtar tweeted, along with a photo of Indian cricket commentator Harsha Bhogle and one of his tweets which read: "Credit to Pakistan. Few teams would have defended 137 the way they did. Best bowling team." Akhtar's response also went viral.
Talking about the match, Ben Stokes and Sam Curran starred as England edged Pakistan by five wickets to become the sport's first dual white-ball champions, holding both the 50 and 20-over titles.
Jos Buttler's side held Pakistan to 137-8 in front of a partisan 80,462 fans at a heaving Melbourne Cricket Ground, with player-of-the-match and tournament Curran bagging 3-12 and Adil Rashid chipping with 2-22.
In reply, England slumped to 49-3 in the sixth over as they struggled to get any momentum against a fiery pace attack, with boundaries hard to come by.
But Stokes (52 not out) and Moeen Ali (19) used their experience and cool heads to guide England to 138-5 with six balls to spare, climaxing a riveting tournament that spanned 45 games over nearly a month.
With AFP inputs