Highlights
- Naseem Shah of Pakistan was awarded as the Man of the Match
- Team Pakistan will now participate in the Asia Cup
- Babar Azam and co. play their first match in the Asia Cup on August 28, 2022 against India
PAK vs NED: The men in green, Babar Azam-led Pakistan team has registered a clinical series victory over hosts Netherlands. Throughout the series, the Dutch team looked out of clues and had no answer to things that were being thrown at them. Even before the series started, Babar Azam-led Pakistan was considered the favorite and they have certainly lived up to that tag. With the momentum on their side, the men in green will now head into the Asia Cup as they take on arch-rivals India on August 28, 2022.
Eyeing a clean sweep in the third One Day International (ODI), Pakistan won the toss and elected to bat first. Seeing the opportunity at hand, the Pakistan team handed Abdullah Shafique his ODI debut cap. The right-handed batsman Shafique could not make the most of this changed and perished to Vivian Kingma's peach of a delivery. On the other hand, Fakhar Zaman, who has been opening for Pakistan consistently could not contribute enough and departed for 26 off deliveries. Zaman tried to hold one end together but he could only leave Pakistan reeling on 58/2. Skipper Babar Azam walked into the crease and as his form is at the moment, the right-handed batsman kept tonking the dutch bowlers for fun.
Azam ended with a score of 91 off 125 deliveries. At a strike rate of 72.80, Azam struck 7 boundaries and 2 sixes. The Pakistan skipper missed his 18th ODI century just by a whisker. Agha Salman, courtesy of his sublime batting in the Sri Lankan tour earned himself the debut cap for Pakistan but could manage to score only 24 runs off 42 deliveries. With the batting order collapsing completely, team Pakistan could manage to score only 206 runs.
When the Dutch batsmen came out to bat, they had a job cut out. They were required to bat sensibly and avoid a clean sweep. Opener Vikramjit Singh managed his business pretty well as he scored 50 off 82 deliveries. Following Singh in his exploits, Tim Cooper too scored a sublime 62 off 105 deliveries. Other than these two Teja Nidamanuru could only manage to score 24 off 32 deliveries.
After a last minute scare, the Netherlands fell short of Pakistan's score by just 9 runs. As Pakistan take the series 3-0, they will feel like a confident bunch as they move into the Asia Cup.
Teams
Netherlands XI: Vikramjit Singh, Max ODowd, Bas de Leede, Tom Cooper, Scott Edwards(w/c), Teja Nidamanuru, Logan van Beek, Musa Ahmed, Shariz Ahmad, Aryan Dutt, Vivian Kingma
Pakistan XI: Fakhar Zaman, Abdullah Shafique, Babar Azam(c), Agha Salman, Khushdil Shah, Mohammad Haris(w), Mohammad Nawaz, Mohammad Wasim Jr, Naseem Shah, Shahnawaz Dahani, Zahid Mahmood
