Captain Pat Cummins kept calm on his return to international cricket, leading Australia to a nervy two-wicket win over Pakistan in the first ODI at the MCGon Monday.
Cummins hit an unbeaten 32 off 31 balls to steer Australia to 204/8 with more than 16 overs to spare after the middle order had stumbled in a modest run chase.
Searing pace from Mitchell Starc (3/33) had earlier helped to bowl Pakistan out for 203 with Cummins, playing his first international since the T20 World Cup in June, picking up 2/39 after the hosts won the toss and elected to bowl first.
“It’s always nice to start the (Australian) summer off in a positive way,” said Cummins. “We are looking for Powerplay wickets, and it was a really positive effort with the ball. Maybe a little sloppy from us in the field.”
Josh Inglis (49) and Steve Smith (44) had the chase under control at 113/2 before Pakistan’s four-pronged pace attack had Australia reeling at 155/7 on a bouncy MCG wicket. Pacer Haris Rauf (3/67) triggered the collapse when he had Smith caught at point, and then Marnus Labuschagne (16) and Glenn Maxwell (0) were undone by sheer pace.
Shaheen Shah Afridi picked up 2/43, but Cummins added 30 runs with Sean Abbott before carrying his side over the line for a 1-0 lead in the three-match series.
Earlier, five of Pakistan’s six top-order batters, fresh from playing on spinning wickets at home against England, struggled to cope with the pace of Starc and Cummins. Babar Azam, who was omitted from the last two Tests against England, made a fluent 37 as the rest of the Pakistan top order crumbled.
Starc removed debutant Saim Ayub in his second over when the left-hander played the ball back onto his stumps, and Abdullah Shafique couldn’t pull his bat out of the way of another short delivery and was caught behind.
Starc, playing his 54th ODI in Australia, reached 100 wickets at home and broke the record of Brett Lee, who achieved the milestone in 55 ODIs. Left-arm quick Starc is now fourth on the all-time list of Australian ODI bowlers, behind Glenn McGrath, Lee and Shane Warne.
Pakistan’s new white-ball captain Mohammad Rizwan struggled to accelerate before leg-spinner Adam Zampa had Babar clean bowled in his first over. Rizwan made 44 off 71 balls before he top-edged a sweep off Labuschagne, with the ball deflecting off his helmet to give wicketkeeper Inglis his third catch.
Kamran Ghulam couldn’t gauge the steep bounce extracted by Cummins and gloved a simple catch behind the wicket before the Pakistan tail-enders frustrated Australia. Naseem Shah smashed a better than a run-a-ball 40 with four sixes and Shaheen scored a quickfire 24 off 19 balls which helped Pakistan cross the 200-run mark.
But Cummins wrapped up the innings by having Naseem caught at mid-off.
Naseem and Afridi then dismissed openers Jake Fraser-McGurk (16) and Matt Short (1) before Smith and Inglis combined in an 85-run partnership. Pakistan fought back with the majority of the 25,831 turnout backing the visitors, but Cummins took his side home at the end.
Naseem injured his left calf in his follow-through and left the field with Australia needing eight for victory.
“We missed some chances, while luck was also with Australia. So, congratulations to them. It’s difficult to read anything into this game, but I’m happy with how we did overall and the fight we put up,” Rizwan said.
The second ODI will be played in Adelaide on Friday.
AP/PTI
