Sean Williams still haunted by WC Qualifiers failure

HARARE: Zimbabwe have lost eight One-day Internationals and four T20Is on the trot since their World Cup dreams ended in anguish with a three-run defeat to UAE at home in March.

After their latest defeat — the ODI series loss against South Africa — all-rounder Sean Williams admitted that both he and the team are still haunted by their rain-affected failure in the World Cup Qualifiers.

“It is very difficult,” Williams said.

“That game against UAE still haunts all of us, the guys who played in that game.” Williams, along with Brendan Taylor, Craig Ervine, Graeme Cremer and Sikandar Raza, fell out with the board in the aftermath of that tournament, missing the disastrous 0-5 defeat to Pakistan in July.

With fences since mended, three of the missing players have now returned and Zimbabwe have had a few chances to bury the ghosts of that game in their latest series. But, just as they did in that game, they have continued to let strong positions slip.“It doesn’t feel good to lose a match, or lose a series,” Williams said.

“Losing the series hurts more than losing this match, but losing this match today takes a lot of pride away from us, and I feel there was a lot of pride to play for in this match [even] after losing the series. After giving ourselves good chances to win the previous two games, we let that slip.”