LAHORE: Quetta Gladiators’ players expressed their disappointment at being knocked out of the tournament against Peshawar Zalmi, losing by just one run at the Gaddafi Stadium here on Tuesday. A repeat of last year’s final saw Quetta fall agonisingly close to the title, with Rahat Ali and Anwar Ali being the standout performers with ball and bat respectively. “Putting in so much effort in a game and still losing is of course disappointing for everyone but it is a part of the game,” Rahat said. “All we can do is give it our best and that is what everyone did.” The 29-year-old left-arm pacer bemoaned his side’s bad luck on the night. “We did all we could and came so close. All that was missing was that luck wasn’t on our side,” he said. “Other than that, the game was in our favour till the very last ball. But it’s our mistake and we have to face the consequences of our mistake. We wish the other teams the best of luck and hope for a good final.” Hamza, meanwhile, was guilty of ball-watching when he should have been running on the final ball. Had he continued to do so, the match would have gone into a super over. However, he himself was unable to explain why he didn’t run. “We all know that it was the last ball and that I shouldn’t have stopped,” he admitted. “To be honest, I don’t know why I did that. Because of that I failed to reach the crease, otherwise we would have had another chance to win the game during the super over. Our batsmen did well and our bowlers also played their part. However, we were unable to kill off the game. I really wish I had taken that run; we might have been playing in the final had I done so.” Hamza did criticise his side’s fielding effort though. “It was just our bad luck that we lost,” he said. “Still I wanted to reach the final so that I could play in front of my home crowd. I will still go to watch the match in Karachi since it will be a great spectacle.” Published in Daily Times, March 22nd 2018.