WELLINGTON: After whitewashing Green Shirts in five-match One-Day International (ODI) series, New Zealand on Monday registered their first victory against Pakistan by 7 wickets in hands and 25 balls in spare in the first T20 International match at Westpac stadium in Wellington.
Winning the toss, the Black Caps invited Green Shirts to bat first. Pakistan top-order batting disappointed yet again as half of the team was sent back to the pavilion at a score of 38. The middle order batsmen and tailenders once again resisted the Kiwis bowling and guide the visiting team to set a target of 106 runs.
The Black Caps achieved the target in 15.5 overs with loss of three wickets.
Pakistani left-arm pacer Rumman Raees struck twice to remove the in-form Martin Guptill and Glenn Phillips early, helping the team to build pressure on the Black Caps as the hosts scored only 8 when they lost two wickets. Guptil scored 2 and Philips was only at 3 when bowled out.
Colin Munro and Tom Brume defused the pressure after building an impressive batting partnership. Kiwis lost the third wicket at 57 when Shadab Khan dismissed Bruce before New Zealand registered their first victory in three-match T20I series.
Earlier, right-arm speedster Tim Southee dismissed Fakhar Zaman at 3 and Mohammad Nawaz at 7.
Pakistan were only 22 when it lost four wickets. Babar Azam’s partnership with skipper Sarfraz Ahmed could not last long as Sarfraz got stumped out after scoring 9 runs.
Babar Azam was the top scorer with 41 runs off 41 balls, followed by 23 runs off 12 by Hasan Ali.
Playing XI
Pakistan: Umar Amin, Fakhar Zaman, Haris Sohail, Sarfraz Ahmed, Babar Azam, Shadab Khan, Faheem Ashradf, Mohammad Nawaz, Hasan Ali, Mohammad Amir, Rumman Raees.
New Zealand: Martin Guptill, Colin Munro, Glenn Phillips, Tom Bruce, Ross Taylor, Anaru Kitchen, Colin de Grandhomme, Mitchell Santner, Tim Southee (capt), Ish Sodhi, Seth Rance.
Umpires: Wayne Knights (NZL), Chris Brown (NZL)
TV Umpire: Shaun Haig (NZL)
Match referee: Richie Richardson (WIS)
