Pakistan played good all-round cricket to beat world champions West Indies by 16 runs in the second Twenty20 in Dubai on Saturday, taking an unassailable 2-0 lead in the three-match series
Pak skipper Sarfraz Ahmed en route his 32-ball 46 vs Windies on Saturday. Pic/Getty Images
Dubai: Pakistan played good all-round cricket to beat world champions West Indies by 16 runs in the second Twenty20 in Dubai on Saturday, taking an unassailable 2-0 lead in the three-match series.
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Skipper Sarfraz Ahmed hit a rapid 32-ball 46 not out to guide Pakistan to 160-4 before pacemen Sohail Tanvir (3-13) and Hasan Ali (3-49) restricted the West Indies to 144-9 at Dubai Stadium. Pakistan had won the first match — also in Dubai — by nine wickets on Friday.
The victory over the world champions gave Pakistan reasons to smile in their campaign to build a new team after they thumped England, also by nine wickets, in Manchester earlier this month. Pakistan were ousted in the first round of the World Twenty20 held in India in April this year, forcing Shahid Afridi to step down as captain.
Pakistan's unassailable lead leaves the final match in Abu Dhabi on Tuesday of academic interest. Tanvir rocked the West Indies top order with the wickets of Evin Lewis (three) and Marlon Samuels (one) before he later dismissed Nicholas Pooran (four). He also completed 50 wickets in the shortest format and now has 52 victims in 53 matches.
Sunil Narine top-scored with 30 while Andre Fletcher made 29 but the West Indies for the second day failed to find the batting skills which earned them two World Twenty20 titles, the first in 2012.
Ali dismissed Fletcher, Kieron Pollard (18) and Carlos Brathwaite (eight) in a daring spell of bowling. Narine hit four boundaries and a six during his 17-ball knock but 74 runs in the last five overs proved too much for the champions.
Brief scores
Pakistan 160-4 in 20 overs (S Ahmed 46*, K Latif 40, S Malik 37; Badree 1-24) beat West Indies 144-9 in 20 overs (S Narine 30, A Fletcher 29; S Tanvir 3-13, H Ali 3-49)
by 16 runs
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