Pakistan coach Mickey Arthur feels his side was given a "reality check" by India in the lost Champions Trophy clash here and the "below-par" show was a result of his players letting the occasion get the better of them.
Arthur admitted that Pakistani players lacked self belief and erred in executing simple plans.
"We were below par. It's as simple as that. And it's a reality check of where we are in our one-day cricket at the moment," Arthur told reporters at the post-match press conference here.
"We talk about setting the tone up front. But we didn't set tone up front. We had a couple of guys that were in the clouds at the start and that sets the tone. For us to have a performance as tentative as that right from the start is a worry and the only thing I can think of is the magnitude of the occasion got to them."
India launched their Champions Trophy campaign with a resounding 124-run victory over Pakistan on Sunday, extending their dominance over the arch-rivals in major ICC tournaments.
Pakistan now need to win their final two games against Sri Lanka and South Africa to stand a chance of qualifying for the semi-finals.
"The guys tried as hard as they could. My issue is fear.
"My issue is getting out there and really looking to take the game on and just believing in themselves and believing that they can take the game on," Arthur said.
"The worrying thing for me, and it has been for a period of time, is we just do the basics wrong. We do the simple things wrong. We drop simple catches. We don't run well enough between wickets," he lamented.
An exasperated Arthur could barely hide his disappointment with his players, who floundered in almost every aspect of the game.
"We don't hit the keeper with our throws. We don't understand when to bowl our variations. We bowled a really good over and then we bowled a variation in our sixth ball and that's the ball that ended up going for a boundary," he said.
"So it's the simplicity of those things that are worrying me at the moment and our understanding of when to do certain things. So that was disappointing. But we'll bounce back from it,"
he added.
"We selected a team that we thought could go out there and rattle the cages of India. Ultimately our execution wasn't good enough today. We thought we had an attack that could really attack them and put them under pressure. And we didn't execute that at all."
The shoddy performance, notwithstanding, Arthur defended Pakistan's record in recent times.