Babar Azam broke the record of Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma with T20I ton against New Zealand
Pakistan captain Babar Azam broke some impressive records in a 101-to-58-ball unbeaten run in the second T20I against New Zealand at Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore on Saturday, April 15.
Pakistan won the pitch and chose to hit the ball first against the Kiwis. Babar hit 11 fourths and three sixths to take his team to 192/4 in their 20 rounds. In response, New Zealand were held to a draw at 154/7 despite Mark Chapman’s undefeated 65 out of 40 balls.
Babar hit his ton, his third in the T20Is, from Pakistan’s final ball of the half with four Jimmy Neesham headers. With his third percentage in the T20Is, the Pakistani tennis player broke Rohit Sharma’s record for the most percentages in captains.
Overall, he is currently second on the list of players with the most hundreds of T20Is. Glenn Maxwell, Colin Munro, and Suryakumar Yadav has three tons of T20I – a list led by Indian captain Rohit (four).
In T20 cricket overall, Babar is now nine centuries old, with six of them captaining. As a result, he broke the 5-ton record of Virat Kohli and Faf du Plessis in T20 cricket as the lead. Australia’s Michael Klinger (seven) tops the list.
In addition, with 9 tons of T20, Babar is now second only to the legendary West Indies Chris Gayle (22) on the list of illustrious with the most number of T20 century. Australian duo David Warner and Aaron Finch each have 8 tons of T20.
“Very pleased with my performance” – Babar Azam
Speaking after being named Man of the Match, Pakistan’s captain Babar said he was very pleased with his efforts and commented:
“I am very pleased with my performance in this match. There was a little help for the fast pitchers early on but (Mohammad) Rizwan and I watched that period pass, built a partnership and then Iftikhar and I finished it. We used five passes and got a very good total.
“Losing consecutive shots is a concern and as we discuss these, it really puts a lot of pressure on hitters when you lose cluster shots. We had very good fast pitchers and they performed brilliantly.”
The third Pakistan-New Zealand T20I will be held at Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore on Monday, April 17.
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