Hammad Azam was on song with his all-around performance as Sindh beat Federal Areas by 85 runs in the fifth match of the Pakistan Cup at Pindi Stadium on Saturday.
Hammad firstly showed brilliance with the bat by scoring 78 runs off just 35 balls and then took four wickets to help the men in blue to cross the victory line comfortably. Another successor for Sindh was Ahsan Ali who struck his maiden century to help his team put a mammoth total of 385-4 while batting first.
After losing an early wicket of Umar Siddiq on just 11 runs, Ahsan and Sahibzad Farhan didn’t look back as both the youngsters put a magnificent 203 runs partnership on the scoreboard to leave opponents under immense pressure.
Ahsan smashed 115 runs off 102 balls which included a6 hits to the fence and two sixes. Farhan scored 83 runs including 12 boundaries. Bilal Asif got rid of both the batsmen to release some pressure from his team.
But it was not over as Hammad and Umar Amin scored 126 runs partnership for the fifth wicket to take Sindh to a gigantic total. Umar made 69 runs with the help of four boundaries and five sixes.
Bilal Asif took two wickets conceding 81 runs in his 10-over spell.
In reply, Federal Areas kept on losing wickets after regular intervals as they got all-out after scoring 300 runs. Openers Ahmad Shahzad and Israrullah failed to give a strong start as both scored just 10 runs each.
Saud Shakeel and Mohammad Rizwan put 37 runs together on the scoreboard for the third wicket to put Federal Areas back on the track but Nauman Ali removed skipper Rizwan to once again put the opponent under pressure. The wicket-keeper batsman managed to contribute 22 runs to his team’s total.
Saud Shakeel fell to Aamir Yamin after playing a valuable knock of 52 runs off 37 balls. Mohammad Nawaz and Ramiz Raja Jr made the last effort for Federal Areas by scoring 122 runs for the sixth wicket but couldn’t manage to reach the target.
Nawaz scored 55 runs while Rameez blasted his way to scoring 70 runs with the help of six boundaries and three sixes.
Umar Gul, Nauman Ali and Aamir Yamin were the other wicket-takers for Sindh. Gul bagged three, Nauman took two while Yamin truck once.
