Islamabad United stunned Quetta Gladiators with a 10 wickets victory in their crucial match
Quetta Gladiators faced an embarrassing defeat against Islamabad United in their crucial match at Sheikh Zayed Stadium on Friday.
Islamabad United won the toss and opted to ball first in match no 18 of HBL PSL 2021. Hassan Ali was handed the ball for the first and it was quite a lousy over as Usman Khan hit three boundaries in the first over.
The scorecard kept moving slowly with few boundaries on the way till the 7th over when the skipper, Shadab Khan bowled Usman Khan 14 (19) when he was confused to play.
Next came the skipper, Sarfraz Ahmed 2 (3) but he was too early to get back to the pavilion. Mohammad Musa picked him in the 8th over when he nicked back to the keeper.
Jake Weatherald comes next on the crease to join Azam Khan. Both of them steadied the ship for Quetta after hitting some boundaries in the next two overs.
Weatherald 43 (35) played a decent inning until Akif Javed comes in, tries to play the paddle shot but misses the ball, and goes straight into the stumps.
West Indian giant, Andre Russel 13 (6) comes next to bat and goes in the same traditional style after hitting two maximums in 14th over but the bowler, Musa gets revenge in the same over as Mohammad Wasim picks up Russel on the short third man.
Quetta kept looking for the miracle to happen but the wickets keep felling until they got bowled out on 133 at the end of 20 overs. Mohammad Wasim, Hassan Ali and Musa Khan picked up two wickets each.
Batting second, Colin Munro and Usman Khawaja powered Islamabad to a massive victory in an unbeaten 137 runs opening stand.
Munro and Khawaja had no fear in the eyes as they jumped onto Naseem Shah in the opening over, to hit 19 runs. Both were going at a great pace as Khawaja completed the 50 runs stand on the 16th ball of the chase.
In the next over, Khurram Shahzad, most economical among all the bowlers, bowled back to back no-balls and was put away with a boundary and a six.
QG conceded 97 runs in the powerplay and there was no way back. Boundary kept coming from everywhere as if it was a child’s play. Munro scored an unbeaten 90 runs off just 36 balls alongside Khawaja who also played an unbeaten knock of 41 off 27 balls.
“Score was low, and bowling wasn’t good, we didn’t expect them to chase so quickly. Got to praise Munro and Khawaja. We didn’t bowl well, and of course, batting wasn’t good either. But we also need help winning the toss,”
said Sarfaraz at the post-match conference.
“The way we played last game, we had come close. We could’ve taken that result negatively or positively, but today’s game showed we took positives out of the last game. The bowling has been good all tournament, and in a T20 tournament your bowling makes you win competitions,”
said the winning captain, Shadab Khan.
Brief Scores: Quetta Gladiators 133 in 20 overs (Jake Weatherhald 43, Azam Khan 26; Mohammad Wasim Jr 2-12, Hasan Ali 2-24) lost to Islamabad United 137 for no loss in 10 overs (Colin Munro 90, Usman Khawaja 41) by 10 wickets.
