The mega event of this year, the ICC T20 World Cup 2024, is just two months away, as the tournament is slated to start from 2nd June. The tournament will be held in the West Indies and USA this time, and all the participating teams have begun their preparations for this year’s mega event.
The players of Pakistan are pretty pumped up as they are currently going through some rigorous training sessions with the Pakistan army and the training camp will take place till 8th April. Besides the training camp, Pakistan Cricket has been a hot topic in recent times as a lot of changes have been made in their Cricket team. Babar Azam has been reappointed as the T20i skipper following back to back defeats in the shortest format of the game. They lost the five match T20i series against New Zealand 4-1 under the captaincy of Shaheen Shah Afridi and some changes had to be made. Babar has been appointed as the skipper once again and this time around, the Shaheens would be looking to lift their second T20 World Cup Trophy under Babar’s leadership.
Bowling All-Rounder Imad Wasim and seamer Mohammad Amir have decided to come out of retirement and have made themselves available for selection for the upcoming 2024 T20 World Cup. Despite Pakistan Cricket featuring constantly in the news, they have to find solutions to some problems and one of them is the opening combination.
Pakistan’s best opening combination for the 2024 T20 World Cup
Under the captaincy of Shaheen Shah Afridi, the Shaheens altered their opening combination as Babar Azam was asked to bat at number three in-order to let Saim Ayub open the innings with Mohammad Rizwan. But the duo of Ayub and Rizwan failed miserably at the top as they failed to register even a single 50+ partnership in the five T20 international matches against New Zealand.
The decision of going away from Babar and Rizwan as the opening duo hurt the Shaheens but now that Babar Azam is back as the skipper, fans will be given another opportunity to witness the most successful opening combination of Pakistan in T20i internationals in action at the 2024 T20 World Cup.
As openers in T20i cricket, the duo of Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan have managed to score 2830 runs in 60 T20 International Games at an outstanding average of 48.79. Their highest opening stand in T20i Cricket is an unbeaten 202* runs against England in 2022. But, the strike rate of the duo has had a negative effect on the team, with both players opting to bat conservatively more often than not. But this time around, we may witness different versions of Babar and Rizwan, as the duo will be looking to put in their maximum efforts to help Pakistan lift their second T20 World Cup title.
Another opening combination which Pakistan may try is letting the duo of Saim Ayub and Babar Azam open the innings.The duo have played phenomenally well for Peshawar Zalmi as the openers and the highest opening stand between the two is 162 runs against Quetta Gladiators in 2023.
Saim Ayub is someone who likes to attack from the word go and with Saim at the other end attacking the bowlers, Babar can take his own sweet time to build his innings and settle down at the crease with ease. But it remains to be seen which opening combo we will get to witness in the upcoming 2024 T20 World Cup.
Read: Pakistan’s predicted 15-member squad for the 2024 T20 World Cup