[Ajfar]

Are we really that insecure abut our own team? That we have to hope that other teams are not improving so that we can say 'we are ahead of them'. Just saying 'we are still ahead of them' in itself is an embarrassment to us. We are a freaking test nation. We complain when G8 teams fans look down on us, or pass harsh judgement on our team, yet we do the same for Afghanistan/Ireland.

Tough luck for Afghanistan. Going up against India & England was always going to be tough. Coming into the tournament they had nothing to lose. Sure they didn't win a game, but they can still go home with their heads high.

Last T20 WC 4 associate teams were allowed to play and from what I remember Afghanistan qualified for that tournament as the 4th team (I might be wrong). This year's WC only 2 associate teams were allowed to play, so they had to work really hard and perform in order to finish on top of the qualifier in order to end up in the WC. That alone is a pretty good achievement for them, Netherlands and Scotland have been playing cricket for quite a while and not to mention most of their players get to play in County Cricket. Afghanistan did pretty well to move from number 4 position to the top 2 position in 2 years. Ireland is still the best associate team, but I don't think Afghanistan is too far behind. I can see things only going up for them.