Fakhar Zaman and Shaheen Shah Afridi were not pleased after the third umpire went against the former’s catch in the T20I Tri-Nation Series final between Pakistan and Sri Lanka at the Rawalpindi Cricket Stadium on Saturday. The incident happened on the first ball of the 19th over when Sri Lanka skipper Dasun Shanaka was on the crease. However, eventually Shaheen and Fakhar had the last laugh as the former ended up rattling the stumps of the right-handed batter on the very next delivery.
Speaking of the catch incident, it happened on the first ball of the 19th over. Shaheen bowled a slower delivery on the stumps, and Shanaka went for a flick, only to get a leading edge. Fakhar ran back, timing his jump perfectly to pouch the catch at short third man. The grab looked clean, but the third umpire started to check whether the ball made any contact with the grass or not.
To everyone’s surprise, the third umpire Rashid Riaz felt that the ball made contact with the turf when Fakhar finished the catch. He gave the verdict as not out, and this led to the entire Pakistani team being stunned. Fakhar also charged towards the on-field umpires, Ahsan Raza and Asif Yaqoob, to make his displeasure known.
However, Shaheen had the final laugh on the very next delivery as he ended up rattling the stumps of Sri Lanka’s captain, and as a result, Shanaka had to walk back after scoring 2 runs off seven balls.
Shaheen was quite pumped up after the dismissal, and he was joined in by Fakhar in the fiery celebration as well. The duo also openly mocked the third umpire by appealing, looking in his direction. Shaheen also put his arms up, seemingly asking if that was good enough for the out verdict to be shown.
Pakistan dominate Sri Lanka
In the T20I Tri-Nation Series final, Pakistan captain Salman Ali Agha won the toss and asked Sri Lanka to bat first. The latter was dominating the contest after being 84/1 in the 11th over. However, everything went downhill from there for the visitors as they lost the remaining nine wickets for 20 runs.
Shaheen and Mohammad Nawaz returned with three wickets each as Sri Lanka was bowled out for 114 in 19.1 overs. For Sri Lanka, Kamil Mishara top-scored with a knock of 59 runs off 47 balls with the help of two fours and four sixes.
Pakistan eventually chased the target of 115 with six wickets in hand and eight balls to spare. For the hosts, opening batter Saim Ayub top-scored with a knock of 36 runs off 33 balls. In the end, Babar Azam and Usman Khan remained unbeaten on 37 and 3, respectively.
