What a cracker jack of a game we've had tonight at Abu Dhabi!! Australia have snatched victory from the jaws of defeat. Pakistan have no one but themselves to blame. It was an unbelievable turn of events at the Sheikh Zayed Stadium. Glenn Maxwell has turned this match upside down as he came into bowl the last over of the match with Pakistan needing just 2 runs for a victory and he produced an incredible over "0 W 0 0 0 W" to turn the match in Australia's favor.
Australia won the toss and chose to bat before being reduced to 231/9 in the allotted 50 overs. Another interesting fact to observe here is the Pakistani captain Misbah-ul-Haq dropped himself in this particular ODI. Last time Misbah missed an ODI was in New Zealand, in Feb 2011. Shahid Afridi was the stand-in captain.
Australia started off steadily and were going really well in the mandatory powerplay just before Aaron Finch's dismissal. Finch has been out of color in this series so far with scores of 0, 14 and 18 that fails Australia in getting a good opening stand. After reaching 100 with half centuries by Warner and Smith.
Australia could not kick on and kept losing wickets at regular intervals. Batting powerplay went horribly wrong for the Australians as they managed to score just 9 runs and lost 2 wickets of Hughes and Haddin at that course of the game. This is the second least number of runs scored in an ODI innings between the overs 36 to 40, lowest being 7 runs by Kenya against Afghanistan. The average batting powerplay score in this series is 25/1.With some late flourish by James Faulkner they eventually creeped up to 231 runs. In the last 20 years there have been only three instances of Australia scoring fewer runs after batting all 50 overs against Pakistan, this being the 4th. Pakistan's
bowling effort was outstanding as they never missed the line and length and did not give away any alarming extras. Shahid Afridi's bowling too looked good as he took 5 wickets in 3 matches this series - he took only 4 wickets in the 10 ODIs before that.
Pakistan came to bat boasting with confidence and so did they do. The openers gave them a decent start followed by Asad Shafiq's half century. Another important record I would like to put to light here is that before this match there have been 3 occasions that 4 of Pakistan's top 5 have made 25+ against Australia in an ODI innings. They lost the last time this happened (2012). Chasing a below par score they were going really good till the 35th over before losing wickets in a heap. But still they had the upper hand as there was no pressure of required run rate. The match went to the last over and it seemed to be a cake walk as Pakistan required 2 runs off the last over with 2 wickets in hand. But that was not to be my friends, it was Maxwell who bowled the last over which is a game changer on a whole as he managed to produce a double wicket maiden to give Australia an unbelievable win. That's why Maxwell is so special as the records also speak of him for Glenn Maxwell is the only one ODI batsmen who have a 30+ average and a 120+ strike rate (min. 25 matches). Undoubtedly he was awarded the Man-of-the-Match.
With this Australia have whitewashed Pakistan winning all three matches in this series.Australia have whitewashed Pakistan 3 times in a bilateral ODI series of three or more matches.
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| The Australia team poses with the trophy after white washing Pakistan |
Australia won the toss and chose to bat before being reduced to 231/9 in the allotted 50 overs. Another interesting fact to observe here is the Pakistani captain Misbah-ul-Haq dropped himself in this particular ODI. Last time Misbah missed an ODI was in New Zealand, in Feb 2011. Shahid Afridi was the stand-in captain.
Australia started off steadily and were going really well in the mandatory powerplay just before Aaron Finch's dismissal. Finch has been out of color in this series so far with scores of 0, 14 and 18 that fails Australia in getting a good opening stand. After reaching 100 with half centuries by Warner and Smith.
bowling effort was outstanding as they never missed the line and length and did not give away any alarming extras. Shahid Afridi's bowling too looked good as he took 5 wickets in 3 matches this series - he took only 4 wickets in the 10 ODIs before that.
Pakistan came to bat boasting with confidence and so did they do. The openers gave them a decent start followed by Asad Shafiq's half century. Another important record I would like to put to light here is that before this match there have been 3 occasions that 4 of Pakistan's top 5 have made 25+ against Australia in an ODI innings. They lost the last time this happened (2012). Chasing a below par score they were going really good till the 35th over before losing wickets in a heap. But still they had the upper hand as there was no pressure of required run rate. The match went to the last over and it seemed to be a cake walk as Pakistan required 2 runs off the last over with 2 wickets in hand. But that was not to be my friends, it was Maxwell who bowled the last over which is a game changer on a whole as he managed to produce a double wicket maiden to give Australia an unbelievable win. That's why Maxwell is so special as the records also speak of him for Glenn Maxwell is the only one ODI batsmen who have a 30+ average and a 120+ strike rate (min. 25 matches). Undoubtedly he was awarded the Man-of-the-Match.
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| Glenn Maxwell during his match defining last over. |
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