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England emerged victoriously in their historic first ever T20I on Pakistan soil. Replacing out-of-form Jason Roy in the side, Alex Hales made an impressive comeback to the England T20I setup with a match-winning 53-run knock coupled with Harry Brook’s unbeaten 42 to help visitors win the game by six wickets.
Chasing 159 at National Stadium, Karachi, England lost their opener Philip Salt for a run-a-ball 10. Shahnawaz Dahani struck with the new ball. After the powerplay overs, England had 47/1 on the board. Babar Azam introduced leg-spinner Usman Qadir into the attack and he got the wicket of Dawid Malan (20). Ben Duckett got off to a decent start as well but lost his wicket to Qadir after scoring 21 runs.
Hales anchored the run chase and decided to take the game deep. In the last six overs, England needed 52 runs. Harry Brook took on Dahani as he conceded 15 runs in the 15th over. In the 17th over, Hales got to his half-century with a boundary off Haris Rauf. After reaching his ninth T20I fifty, Hales got out as he mistimed his pull shot. He scored 53 runs from 40 deliveries including seven fours.
The 23-year-old Brook kept his calm and finished the run chase in the final over. Brook's 25-ball 42 was laced with seven boundaries as well. On the other end, stand-in skipper Moeen Ali scored seven runs from nine deliveries. Teenage pace sensation Naseem Shah turned out to be the most expensive bowler as he conceded 41 runs from four overs and remained wicketless.
In the first innings, Pakistan got off to an impressive start as Mohammad Rizwan batted with an impressive strike rate. After powerplay overs, they had 51 runs on the board. In the ninth over, Rizwan got to his half-century with a six off Moeen Ali. He reached the 50-run mark from 32 deliveries. In the next over skipper Babar lost his wicket to Adil Rashid. The two shared an 85-run opening partnership. Babar scored 31 runs from 24 deliveries including three boundaries.
Haider Ali came in to bat at no.3 instead of Shan Masood. Haider (11) did not make an impact and got out in the 14th over to Sam Curran. Rizwan got out just before the slog overs. He scored 68 runs from 46 deliveries including six fours and two sixes. At the start of the death overs, Masood lost his wicket to Rashid which had an impact on the final score.
Iftikhar Ahmed helped Pakistan cross the 150-run mark but could not help them post a threatening total. Luke Wood impressed on his T20I debut and got wickets of Iftikhar (28), Mohammad Nawaz (4) and Naseem (0) in the slog overs. In the end, the hosts managed to post 158/7.
