Former Pakistan skipper Babar Azam becomes the third-highest runscorer in T20Is after scoring his 31st fifty in style during the first T20I match against New Zealand in Auckland. Despite Babar’s solid innings, Pakistan failed to chase down the target as New Zealand won the match to take a 1-0 lead in the series.
Pakistan’s batting maestro, scored fifty on just 33 balls, scoring 5 Fours and 2 sixes, while playing a leader’s knock, pacing his innings with precision. He has three tons in T20Is and 19 centuries in ODIs, closing in on Saeed Anwar’s feat of most ODI centuries (20).
Babar Azam is now behind Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma who have amassed massive runs in T20Is, scoring 4,038 and 3,853 runs respectively.
| Player | Innings | Runs | Average | Strike Rate | 100s |
| Virat Kohli | 107 | 4,008 | 52.73 | 137.96 | 1 |
| Rohit Sharma | 141 | 3,853 | 31.07 | 139.14 | 4 |
| Babar Azam | 99 | 3,542 | 41.67 | 128.84 | 3 |
| Martin Guptill | 118 | 3,531 | 31.81 | 135.70 | 2 |
| Paul Stirling | 133 | 3,438 | 28.18 | 135.72 | 1 |
Before this innings, Babar had not scored a single fifty in the last 12 innings and was direly struggling with his batting form.
However, he lost his wicket to Ben Sears after scoring 57 runs off 35 balls and from there the batting collapse began which helped New Zealand achieve a victory by 47 runs in the five-match T20I series.
This innings will help Babar gain more confidence and hopefully the Pakistani cricket fans will see another “rich vein of form” from Pakistan’s premium batsman in this grueling New Zealand series.
