Australia narrowly defeated Pakistan by two wickets in a tense first One Day International at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, taking a 1-0 lead in the three-match series.
Chasing a target of 204, Australia found themselves in a precarious position at 185/8. However, a composed captain’s knock of 32 not out from Pat Cummins saw them home.
Earlier, Pakistan struggled to build substantial partnerships after being put in to bat. Mohammed Rizwan (44) and Babar Azam (37) offered some resistance, while Naseem Shah (40) and Shaheen Afridi (24) provided late-order hitting to take their team to a respectable total. Mitchell Starc was the pick of the Australian bowlers, claiming 3/33.
Despite using eight bowlers and making the chase more challenging than necessary, Cummins defended his strategy. “Tonight we got it done, always much prefer sitting in the changing room. Wonderful match but got a bit tighter than we would have liked,” Cummins said after the match.
“Trying to keep it interesting (on trying eight bowlers), Marnus (Labuschagne) is always in my ear so he had to have an over, he got one wicket. With this being an ODI and with the conditions, got plenty of allrounders, might as well use them. For three-quarters we were really good, try and find some partnerships, looking to play aggressively and sometimes it may not work, but think still room to try and find a couple of partnerships.” he added.
Starc was awarded Player of the Match for his bowling performance. The second ODI will be played on Wednesday at the same venue.
