Zimbabwe misery ends as Pakistan win 5-0

After surrendering meekly with the bat in the four previous ODIs, all Zimbabwe wanted was to bat out 50 overs to give a good account of themselves. A daunting target of 365 did little to change their approach as the white towel was thrown in right at the start of the chase.

Zimbabwe’s approach even prompted Pakistan skipper Sarfraz Ahmed to remove his wicketkeeping pads and gloves in order to bowl a couple of overs in order to close out the game as the visitors clinched the series 5-0.

When Zimbabwe nudged to 20 for no loss in the first six overs, it was already their best opening partnership in the series.

Hamilton Masakadza and Tinashe Kanhukamwe kept finding the boundary, but they were content on finding those runs at their own comfortable pace as 44 came at the end of the powerplay.

Job well done for the moment! Pakistan then took four more overs to strike as Kanhukamwe finally perished while trying to pull Mohammad Nawaz.

Imam-ul-Haq at midwicket took a good diving low catch.

All the good work appeared to be undone when Hasan Ali struck three balls later by shattering Masakadza’s stumps, but this time, he ensured that one of his teammates did his trademark celebration instead of him following the freak injury earlier in the series.

But Prince Masvaure and Ryan Murray adopted a similar approach as they were content on batting out the overs, finding the odd boundary whenever a loose delivery was bowled. Both batsmen fell soon after adding 78 for the third wicket, but Peter Moor and Elton Chigumbura ensured that there was no damage done, leading the side to 233/4 in their quota, falling well short by 131 runs.

The victory though was once again set up by the batsmen as Pakistan’s top order managed to all but secure the 5-0 result following another impressive show with the willow.

At one point, it appeared as if Imam and Fakhar Zaman would repeat their triple century partnership heroics after making a similar start.

Quite interestingly, it was Imam who took the lead when it came to the scoring as Zaman looked watchful at the start.

Once he reached his half-century, Zaman slowly pressed on the accelerator with the innings approaching the halfway mark. He was just 15 short of the century at that point with his strike rate finally going past three figures, but before the fans could get excited about the possibility of another 200, he edged Liam Roche behind.

In the process though, he became the fastest batsman to reach 1 000 runs in the format (18 innings), three fewer than the previous record which was held by five batsmen.

The boundaries did dry up for a few overs post the dismissal, but Imam at the other end was in his elements again to bring up his third hundred of the series; a feat that only got overshadowed by Zaman’s heroics.

Zimbabwe then tried their best to claw back with quick wickets as both Imam and Shoaib Malik were dismissed before they could shift gears, but Babar Azam put Pakistan’s innings right back on track.

While Asif Ali used the long handle to good effect initially, Babar went on a rampage during the final five overs. In the last three overs alone, the young batsman fetched six fours and a six to bring up his eighth ODI century; the second fifty taking just 16 deliveries.

A 5-0 hiding looked imminent at that point in time. Perhaps, it was imminent the moment Sarfraz opted to bat in the morning. — Cricbuzz