Pakistan tour of South Africa 2021

05 Apr 2021

Pakistan opener Fakhar Zaman continued to impress in the ongoing ODI series as the left-hander brought up his 2nd successive hundred in the 3rd ODI against South Africa at the SuperSport Park in Centurion on Wednesday.

Fakhar Zaman hit his 6th ODI hundred in the crunch series decider between South Africa and Pakistan. The opener was in complete control of his knock from the word go after South Africa won the toss and put Pakistan in to bat.

Fakhar Zaman hit as many as 3 sixes and 9 boundaries for his 104-ball 101. This was the first time Fakhar has hit back-to-back ODI hundreds in his career. Notably, the Pakistan opener becomes only the 3rd visiting batsman after Kevin Pietersen in 2005 and Joe Root in 2016 to hit back-to-back ODI hundreds in South Africa.

Notably, Fakhar had hit a valiant 193 in the 2nd ODI which Pakistan lost by 17 runs. Fakhar fell just 7 runs short of his 2nd ODI hundred but the Pakistan star set a new world record for the highest ODI score by a batsman batting second.

Thanks to Fakhar’s stunning single-handed effort in the 2nd ODI, the Pakistan batsman rose to the 12 spot on ICC’s ODI Rankings, which were updated on Wednesday.

Earlier in the day, Fakhar stitched a 112-run opening stand with Imam-ul-Haq who hit a quickfire 57 before falling in the 22nd over. He then added a 94-run stand with captain Babar Azam and set up a solid platform for the visitors to go big in the final overs in the series decider.

Fakhar, it seems, has successfully put behind the disappointment of missing out on the double hundred on Sunday. He was controversially run-out on 193 after Quinton de Kock tried to ‘deliberately’ distract him in the final over where Pakistan needed 31 runs.

Fakhar was comfortably positioned to complete the 2nd run after he hit one towards the cover boundary. However, a direct hit from the deep by Aiden Markram ended the valiant effort as he was run-out at the striker's end.

Replays showed that de Kock tricked Fakhar into believing that the throw was going to the non-striker's end. While Zaman was still in the process of completing the second run, de Kock seemingly raised his hand and signalled towards the non-striker's end.