Touring Pakistan for the first time since the unfortunate withdrawal in 2021, New Zealand clashed with the home team on Friday, April 14 in the first T20I of the five-match series at Lahore’s Gaddafi Stadium. In the first match itself, New Zealand’s Matt Henry scripted history as he became only the fourth bowler from New Zealand to claim a hat-trick in T20Is.
Winning the toss, Babar Azam, who made his way back to the squad after skipping the series against Afghanistan, decided to bat first and set the score for New Zealand to follow. However, the home side had a disastrous initiation as both the openers fell cheaply to leave Pakistan stranded on a score of 30/2 after the first 26 balls of the innings. While skipper Babar only managed to score 9 runs, Rizwan faced 10 balls to only add 8 runs.
Fakhar Zaman and Saim Ayub attempted to stabilise the innings for Pakistan with equinumerous scores of 47, before losing their wickets. However, the momentum established by Zaman and Ayub in the home side’s favour was smashed by Matt Henry in the 13th over, when he got rid of danger men Shadab Khan and Iftikhar Ahmed on successive deliveries. Henry deceived Shadab with length, picking up on the bounce that was on offer on the Gaddafi pitch.
Shadab attempted to cut the ball towards point but only managed to get an edge off it as the ball landed safely on the gloves of wicketkeeper Tom Latham. On the very next delivery, which also happened to be the last of the over, Iftikhar Ahmed met with a similar fate, albeit, unlike Shadab, he had only attempted to defend the ball. The ball, however, managed to take a kiss off the willow which was grabbed again by Latham behind the stumps. Henry successfully reviewed it to grab his second wicket on the trot after his appeal was initially turned down by the umpire.
He came back in the 19th over to finish his quota and on the very first ball itself, he got Shaheen Shah Afridi caught near the ropes in a relay effort, after the no.9 had lofted him to almost hit a maximum. Thus, Henry managed to claim a successful hat-trick to become the only fourth Kiwi to do so in T20Is. Before Henry, Jacob Oram, Tim Southee and Michael Bracewell had pulled off a similar achievement in international cricket’s shortest format. Notably, this was also Henry’s best performance in T20 international cricket, surpassing his previous best of 3/44 against Sri Lanka in 2016.
Lower order stands tall to put Pakistan in commanding position
Earlier, following a top-order collapse, Pakistan’s lower-order came to the rescue to put Pakistan in a commanding position in the first T20I. Faheem Ashraf notched up a 16-ball-22, whereas, Imad Wsaim contributed with a 13-ball-16 to set the tone before Haris Rauf slammed a six and a four to hit 11 off 5 balls to help Pakistan post a total of 182.
Fakhar Zaman and Saim Ayub had done the repairing work in the middle by stitching together a 79-run partnership for the third wicket, before Ayub ran himself out on 47. Ayub’s 28-ball innings comprised six fours and two sixes. Zaman, too, hit two sixes to complement his four fours as the 33-year-old also scored 47 in 34 deliveries, before being dismissed by Ish Sodhi.
For New Zealand, apart from Henry’s tryst with the ball, Adam Milne and Benjamin Lister picked two wickets each.