National T20: Central Punjab to take on Sindh, Balochistan to face Northern today
National T20: Central Punjab to take on Sindh, Balochistan to face Northern today
(Dunya News) - In the National T20 Cup at Lahore, two matches are being played today (Wednesday) after break of two days.
In the first match, Central Punjab will take on Sindh at 3:00 in the afternoon while in the second match Balochistan will face Northern at 7:30 in the evening.
The winner of Sindh-Central Punjab match will move to 10 points and put one step in the semi-finals, while Northern will prefer to follow in the footsteps of the earlier match’s winner though they are expected to face stiff resistance from Balochistan who will be keen to move to six points and remain close to the frontrunners.
Unsurprisingly, world’s No.2 ranked T20I batsman Babar Azam is the leading run-scorer after six matches. The Pakistan captain has scored 286 runs at an average of 71.5 with a strike-rate of 143. He is followed by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Sahibzada Farhan (220 runs, 36.66 avg., 133.33 strike-rate), Sharjeel Khan of Sindh (212, 35.33 avg., 148.25 strike-rate), Northern’s Haider Ali (208, 52 avg., 141.49 strike-rate), Mohammad Rizwan of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (193, 32.16 avg., 129.53 strike-rate) and Abdul Wahid Banglazai of Balochistan (184, 36.8 avg., 111.51 strike-rate).
Pakistan’s premier fast bowler Shaheen Shah Afridi leads the bowling chart with 12 wickets with an economy-rate of 8.58. Six bowlers are tied at nine wickets apiece, namely Wahab Riaz, Hasan Ali (both Central Punjab), Asif Afridi, Imran Khan (both Khyber Pakhtunkhwa), Shahnawaz Dahani (Sindh) and Haris Rauf (Northern), while Sindh’s Ruman Raees is the only bowler with eight wickets.
The six captains are excited and keenly looking forward to the remaining 12 round matches of the Lahore-leg, which will be followed by semi-finals on 12 October and the final on 13 October.
