Almost a decade after his retirement, Shahid Afridi remains famous for many things and infamous for a few, too. Among the latter are the ducks. Ask most cricket fans born before the 2000s, and they’d remember him as the Pakistani superstar who’d either go big and Boom Boom or get out for zero.
Unfortunately, for the next big sensation of the country’s men’s cricket, Babar Azam, he has already surpassed him in that. On Tuesday (November 18), Babar recorded his ninth duck in T20 internationals, while batting against Zimbabwe in the first T20I of the home tri-series, beating Afridi’s career record of eight.
Babar is now only behind youngster Saim Ayub and the retired former wicketkeeper Umar Akmal, who had 10 each, for most ducks in Pakistan men’s
cricket.
The former skipper got out for 0 (3) against Zimbabwe at the Rawalpindi Cricket Stadium. Pacer Brad Evans set him up perfectly, making the first two deliveries shape away from the right-hander, before going wide of the crease for the third and making it jag back in. Babar’s feet didn’t move, and he got stuck on the back pad.
Babar reviewed the on-field call of out, but it turned out to be umpire’s call on hitting the wickets.
This was his third duck in six innings, with the previous two coming against South Africa. He also became only the eighth Pakistani batter to get out for a duck against Zimbabwe.
Thankfully for Babar, Pakistan went on to win the match in the last over by five wickets. Zimbabwe scored 147/8 in the first innings and Fakhar Zaman’s 44 and Mohammad Nawaz’s late 21 (12) sealed the win with four balls to spare.
“It was a close game,” skipper Salman Agha said afterwards, as quoted by Cricbuzz. “I think we started well in both departments – bowling and batting – and when you don’t start well the games get tight towards the end. The spinners have been doing well for the past 4–5 months. Whoever comes on – Shadab, Nawaz, or Abrar – they always take wickets and don’t give many runs. They brought us back into the game. Last night when I saw the pitch, I knew it wouldn’t be very high-scoring. Normally, Rawalpindi is high-scoring, but recently it hasn’t been. I thought 160–180 would be par. We bowled well, and while chasing 147 I was happy, but we didn’t start well in the powerplay. After that, we had to play accordingly.”
