Asia Cup opener: Pakistan thrash Nepal by 238 runs

Pakistan thrashed Nepal by a huge margin of 238 runs in the opening match of the Asia Cup 2023 in Multan on Wednesday.

Pakistan is hosting the Asia Cup after 15 years and the opening match was played at the Multan Cricket Stadium after a grand ceremony where captain Babar Azam won the toss and elected to bat first against Nepal.

The host restricted the visitors to 104 as they were chasing the challenging target of 343 runs.

Shadab Khan took four wickets while Shaheen Shah Afridi and Haris Rauf removed two Nepalese players each.

While batting first, a strong partnership of Pakistan skipper Babar Azam and middle-order batsman Iftikhar Ahmed helped Pakistan set a strong target of 343 runs for Nepal.

Babar Azam held the reins after the green team suffered early losses following the removal of Imam ul Haq and Fakhar Zaman.

Babar Azam and Iftikhar Ahmed built a fifth-wicket partnership as the former made 151 off 131 while the latter scored an unbeaten 109 runs.

When Pakistan started batting, Fakhar Zaman’s poor performance continued and he was dismissed for 14 runs off 21 balls.

Imam-ul-Haq was also soon run out on 25, having scored 5 runs off 14 balls.

Mohammad Rizwan came in to support Babar Azam and the two experienced batsmen took the score to 111 runs and tried to get the team back on track.

Mohammad Rizwan could score 44 runs.

Babar Azam completed a half-century in the first match of the Asia Cup, but Agha Salman could not support him for long from the second end and was dismissed for 5 runs.

Babar Azam with an individual score of 143 runs, became the second batsman to play the highest innings in the Asia Cup, Previously, India’s legendary batsman Virat Kohli scored 183 runs against Pakistan in 2012.

The skipper also crossed the 150-run milestone for the second time in his ODI career and earned the distinction of playing the highest individual innings for Pakistan in the Asia Cup.

Babar Azam and Iftikhar Ahmed put on a partnership of 214 runs off 131 balls, including Babar Azam’s 102 and Iftikhar’s 109, making it Pakistan’s highest partnership for the fifth wicket.

Iftikhar Ahmed completed his century in 67 balls which is the fourth fastest century in the Asia Cup.

Babar Azam was caught out by substitute fielder Jura in the last over off the ball of Sompal Kami, but he played a brilliant innings of 151 runs off 131 balls with the help of 14 fours and 4 sixes.

Shadab Khan came in to bat in the last two balls and was bowled on the last ball after hitting a boundary.

Pakistan scored 342 runs for 6 wickets in the allotted 50 overs.

Iftikhar Ahmed remained not out by scoring 109 runs off 71 balls with the help of 11 fours and 4 sixes.

Sompal Kami was the top wicket-taker for Nepal with 2 wickets, and Karan KC and Sandeep Lamichhane got one wicket each.

Nepal chased down the big target with a boundary off Shaheen Shah Afridi on the first ball, but the Maynaz bowler had Kushal Bhurtel caught by Mohammad Rizwan on the fifth ball.

Shaheen Shah Afridi scored the second victory by sending Nepal captain Rohit Paudel to the pavilion on the last ball of the first over.

Naseem Shah dismissed Aasif Shaikh, who had scored 5 runs, in his second and first over of the innings.

Pakistani bowlers took Nepal’s 3 wickets for 14 runs and made the Nepali team, which is visibly inexperienced in the world of cricket, difficult.

Aarif Sheikh and Sompal Kami put on a 59-run partnership for the fourth wicket for Nepal to take the score to 73 runs.

Fast bowler Haris Rauf took Pakistan’s fourth wicket of Aarif in the 15th over to end a good Nepal partnership.

Aarif Sheikh scored 26 off 38 balls with 5 fours.

Haris Rauf also targeted the second batsman Sompal Kami in his next over, who scored 28 runs off 46 balls with 4 fours.

Nepal’s 5th wicket had fallen on the score of 82.

Mohammad Nawaz on the score of 90 blew the wickets of Deepandra Singh who had just added 3 runs to the total.

National team vice-captain Shadab Khan dealt another blow to Nepal in the 22nd over when Gulson Jha, who played an innings of 13 runs, was caught by Fakhar, at which time Nepal’s score was 91 runs and it was the seventh wicket to fall.

Shadab dismissed Sandeep Lamichhane for a wicket on the fifth ball of the 22nd over.

Shadab Khan took the last two wickets in the 24th over of the innings to dismiss Nepal for 104 runs.

The visiting entire team was bowled out for 104 runs on the fourth ball of the 24th over.

Pakistan Squad:

Babar Azam (captain), Shadab Khan (vice-captain), Abdullah Shafique, Faheem Ashraf, Fakhar Zaman, Haris Rauf, Iftikhar Ahmed, Imamul Haq, Muhammad Haris (wk), Mohammad Nawaz, Muhammad Rizwan (wk), Muhammad Wasim Jnr, Naseem Shah, Salman Ali Agha, Saud Shakeel, Shaheen Afridi and Usama Mir.

Nepal Squad:

Rohit Paudel (c), Aarif Sheikh, Aasif Sheikh, Dipendra Singh Airee, Kushal Bhurtel, Mousom Dhakal, Gulsan Jha, Sundeep Jora, Karan KC, Kushal Malla, Sandeep Lamichhane, Kishore Mahato, Pratis GC, Lalit Rajbanshi, Arjun Saud, Bhim Sharki, Sompal Kami.