Hassan Ali's return and Pakistan's victory in the series

Hassan Ali's return and Pakistan's victory in the series

 

Sometimes things change so much that even the most trivial and ordinary things suddenly become very important and extraordinary. It is to be said that this series was also a minor one in which no enthusiasm was expected.

But the harder Pakistan made their victory in the first match, the more likely it was that the series would be interesting. And in the second match, making the easy goal difficult, the way Pakistan embraced an unexpected defeat, it doubled the importance of today's match.

Zimbabwe had nothing to lose. Even if they lost, no one would be surprised that this is the team that is not a part of this year's T20 World Cup. But if Williams' team had won here, it would have been a historic moment for Zimbabwe to win the T20 series against a Test-playing country for the first time.

Interestingly, the boundaries were kept large in the current series, contrary to tradition. Boundaries are usually set at 60 meters to 65 meters in T20, but the distance here was about five to seven meters more, which resulted in six gaps as a whole.

In T20, batsmen have become so accustomed to power hitting and six fours that single doubles are not given much importance.

In the last match, both Pakistan and Zimbabwe batsmen made the same mistake. When the strike was not rotated and the boundaries were missing, the result was a weak set that did not meet the standards of T20 cricket in any way.

Pakistan learned a good lesson from this and Rizwan, unlike the defensive strategy of the previous match, kept himself fully engaged here. The strike did not stop at any one end in Babar Azam and his partnership and in the end it proved to be a clear margin in the match. On the other hand, Pakistan made a couple of strange decisions in the selection which the data available to support or refute. Not enough, but it was a decision that was immediately supported by encouraging data.

This decision was the return of Hassan Ali. Even in such a low profile series, the big teams never try to give a chance to their two most senior attack bowlers to rest together, but Pakistan unexpectedly put their two most experienced bowlers on the bench in the first two matches.

It was also important for Shaheen Shah Afridi and Hassan Ali to take a break as their workload is likely to be much higher in the next two Test matches. The decision was not a bad one in this context, but since Mohammad Hasnain and Haris Rauf failed to live up to expectations, one of the two experienced bowlers had to return.

A target of 150 runs on this wicket is also a challenge. But it was not far-fetched that the experience of Brendon Taylor and Sean Williams in the middle order would have taken Zimbabwe across the line and crossed a historic milestone. His wishes were not fulfilled. Hassan Ali may prove to be expensive at times but T20 needs a bowler like him for every team who knows how to change their line, length and speed by reading the opportunity, the context and the intentions of the batsman and even in this change. So much variety that even experienced batsmen can't answer.

Although this series victory of Pakistan was not as tasty as it was against South Africa, but in any case it is a series win and the victory requires congratulations. Mohammad Rizwan is bringing so much brilliance in his game one after the other that the words of praise are getting less and less and this career best performance of Hassan Ali is undoubtedly deserving of praise and admiration.