Ricky Ponting: “If anything, he’s probably got better and better in the last couple of years”
Image taken by: Bimal Mirwani
Former Australia captain Ricky Ponting expressed his amazement at the fact that Pakistan skipper Babar Azam has continued to get increasingly better over the last couple of years.
Azam has cemented his reputation as one of the elite batsmen in the world through consistent performances in all three formats.
In the recent seven-match T20 series against England, he excelled with the bat once again, scoring 285 runs, which included a century and a fifty, at an average of 57 and a strike-rate of 143.21.
“If anything, he’s probably got better and better in the last couple of years,” Ponting told The ICC Review.
Azam is now leading Pakistan in a T20 tri-series against New Zealand and Bangladesh in Christchurch, where he has amassed 122 runs in three matches, which includes a top score of 79 not out, at an average of 61 and a strike-rate of 120.79.
He will then captain the men in green in the 2022 T20 World Cup in Australia, which starts on October 16.
Pakistan’s Squad for T20 Tri-Series against New Zealand and Bangladesh: Babar Azam (capt), Shadab Khan, Shaheen Afridi, Iftikhar Ahmed, Asif Ali, Haider Ali, Mohammad Hasnain, Shan Masood, Mohammad Nawaz, Usman Qadir, Haris Rauf, Mohammad Rizwan (wk), Khushdil Shah, Naseem Shah, Mohammad Wasim Jr
Pakistan’s 2022 T20 World Cup squad: Babar Azam (capt), Shadab Khan, Asif Ali, Haider Ali, Haris Rauf, Iftikhar Ahmed, Khushdil Shah, Mohammad Hasnain, Mohammad Nawaz, Mohammad Rizwan (wk), Mohammad Wasim Jr, Naseem Shah, Shaheen Afridi, Shan Masood, Usman Qadir
Reserves: Fakhar Zaman, Mohammad Haris, Shahnawaz Dahani
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