Pak vs Eng: Babar Azam, Mohammad Rizwan create records in first T20

KARACHI: Pakistan’s top order batting duo Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan added a few more feathers to their caps on Friday during the first T20I match against England in Nottingham.

Babar smashed three sixes and eight fours to score 85 off 49, while Rizwan scored 63 off 41. They added 150 runs to the first wicket partnership.

Century partnership

This was the 10th time Babar was involved in a 100+ stand in a T20I game, the most century stands for any Pakistani batsman and jointly the second in the world.

Martin Guptill and David Warner were also involved in 10 century partnerships in T20I. They are just one 100+ partnership behind India’s Rohit Sharma, who was involved in 11 such partnerships.

Of his 10 century partnerships, Babar was joined by Rizwan thrice, making them the most successful batting partners for Pakistan in terms of century stands.

Rizwan and Babar have batted together 12 times and share 670 runs together. The batting pair of Shoaib Malik and Umar Akmal added 797 in 24 innings together, while Mohammad Hafeez and Ahmed Shahzad have 741 runs in 21 innings as batting partners.

Only two pairs in the world - Shikhar Dhawan and Rohit Sharma and Martin Guptill and Kane Williamson - have more century stands than Babar and Rizwan. The Indian and Kiwi pair have four century stands apiece to their credit.

Babar beats Kohli

Babar’s 85 was his 20th score of 50 or more in a T20I inning and the tally also includes a century. The Pakistan captain reached this landmark in the 53rd inning of his career. No other player has achieved this feat this quick since their debut.

India’s Virat Kohli had 18 scores of fifty or more and accumulated 1983 runs as compared to Babar’s 2120 runs after 53 innings.

Most T20 runs in a calendar year

Rizwan, with his score of 63, took his total T20I runs tally for the ongoing calendar year to 593 runs to surpass Fakhar Zaman’s record of most T20I runs in a calendar year by a Pakistani batsman. Fakhar had scored 576 runs in 2018.

With a lot of T20I scheduled this year for Pakistan, there’s a strong likelihood for the Pakistani wicket-keeper batsman to break the world record of Ireland’s Paul Stirling who had scored 748 runs in 2019.

Highest-ever total by Pakistan in T20

This effort by Babar and Rizwan helped Pakistan post a mammoth 232/6 against England, the highest ever T20I team total by Pakistan.

The match also saw the first-ever T20I century being scored against Pakistan as Liam Livingstone smashed 103 off 43 to help his side fight against Pakistan, but fell short.

Father-son duo to play for Pakistan

Earlier in the game, Azam Khan was handed the T20I cap by Sarfaraz Ahmed as the young batsman added his name into the history books.

With inclusion in the final XI, Azam - the son of Moin Khan - became the fifth player to represent Pakistan whose father had also represented the country.

The other father-son duos to play international cricket for the country include Hanif Mohammad - Shoaib Mohammad, Nazar Mohammad - Mudassar Nazar, Majid Khan - Bazid Khan and Abdul Qadir - Usman Qadir.