Babar Azam starred with the bat and Shaheen Afridi delivered with the ball as Pakistan beat England in the first T20 at Trent Bridge.
Put into bat after England won the toss, Pakistan left behind their ODI woes as Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan took the charge against a full strength England side. The two openers put on a record 150 run stand as Pakistan posted their highest T20 score.
Babar impresses again.
Babar completed his half century of 35 balls with his usual elegance mixed with an aggressive approach He scored 158 in the final ODI, and carried the form to the shortest format of the game. A blistering knock of 85 runs of just 49 balls. Despite Rizwan’s early struggles he also reached the 50 run mark of 34 balls.
Late cameos by Fakhar Zaman and Mohammad Hafeez took Pakistan to 232.
Shaheen shines with the ball.
Shaheen under fire for his performances struck early to dismiss Dawid Malan. He then came back to rid of Jonny Bairstow. He was well backed by Mohammad Hasnain who gave away only 28 runs in his four overs keeping things tight at one end.
Liam Livingstone played a fiery knock and scored a stunning 42- ball ton to keep the game alive for England. He single handedly took the fight to Pakistan and led an assault that had England dreaming of pulling of a sensational win.
But once Shadab, at the receiving end of Livingstone’s charge got his wicket, England were always struggling to win the game. Shaheen then wrapped up the win when clean bowled Matthew Parkinson for the last wicket of the game.
Brief scores:
Pakistan 232/6 in 20 overs (Babar Azam 85, Mohammad Rizwan 63; Tom Curran 2-47) beat England 201 all out in 19.2 overs (Liam Livingstone 103; Shaheen Afridi 3-30, Shadab Khan 3-52) by 31 runs.