CENTURION: Saim Ayub played a brilliant knock of 98* to lead Pakistan in posting a 207-run target against South Africa during the second T20I at the Centurion Park on Friday.
Saim had opened the innings for Pakistan with captain Mohammad Rizwan and kept a steady flow of runs. However, Rizwan was short-lived as he was dismissed by Ottneil Baartman after scoring just 11 runs from 13 balls.
Saim was joined by Babar Azam who struck back-to-back two fours. Soon the powerplay came to an end the scoreboard was at 45/1 for Pakistan.
After the powerplay, the pair continued batting steadily and took Pakistan to 90/1 at the end of the 10th over with Saim nearing to a 50 and Babar added 29 runs off 16 balls with three fours and one six.
Babar fell against George Linde after scoring 31 off 20 deliveries, taking Pakistan’s score to 112/2.
After Babar’s dismissal, the Proteas bowlers found themselves back in the game as Dayyaan Galiem sent Usman Khan back to the pavilion in the next over.
Usman’s replacement, Tahir, also got out on the first ball of the 15th over bowled by Galiem after scoring six singles off six balls.
However, Saim kept on hitting the South African bowlers all over the ground and just fell two runs short from scoring his first ever T20I hundred in the 27th game of his career.
Pakistan finished the innings with a score of 206 runs at the loss of five wickets in 20 overs.
Earlier, Pakistan won the toss and elected to bat.
Pakistan made one change to their Playing XI. Pacer Jahandad Khan was included in the squad in place of spinner Sufiyan Muqeem owing to the conditions at the SuperSport Park.
After wrapping up the T20I series, Pakistan and South Africa will play a three-match ODI series.
The opening ODI will take place on December 17 in Paarl, while the second and third ODIs will be played in Cape Town and Johannesburg on December 19 and 22 respectively.
Pakistan and South Africa will then engage in a two-match Test series, which will kick off in Centurion on December 26, meanwhile, the second Test will start from January 3 in Cape Town.
Playing XIs
Pakistan: Mohammad Rizwan (c & wk), Saim Ayub, Babar Azam, Usman Khan, Tayyab Tahir, Muhammad Irfan Khan, Abbas Afridi, Shaheen Afridi, Jahandad Khan, Haris Rauf, Abrar Ahmed
South Africa: Ryan Rickelton, Reeza Hendricks, Matthew Breetzke, Rassie van der Dussen, Heinrich Klaasen (c & wk), Donovan Ferreeia, George Linde, Dayyaan Galiem (on debut), Nqaba Peter, Kwena Maphaka, Ottneil Baartman
