It was a David Wiese show at the National Stadium Karachi as he hit six boundaries in nine balls to take Lahore Qalandars home in a thriller against Karachi Kings. Wiese arrived at the crease when 34 runs were needed off 16 balls and Dan Christian had removed a settled Fakhar Zaman. He took three balls and to hit just one four and just when fans thought that the chasing would get tougher for Qalandars, the South African got going, hitting his next six balls for 25 runs.
Wiese was lucky no doubt. In the Mohammad Amir over, a miss-timed hook went over the keeper’s head for four while on the very next ball, a yorker got undercut by his bat to beat a wrong-footed Joe Clarke’ diving away to his left to go for another four. Surviving these two shots, he then hit Amir for six over mid-off and tilted the game in Qlanadars favour.
Just when 10 runs were needed off the last over, Wiese was offered a length ball which he hit over’s the bowler’s head for a huge six, before hitting a four of the next ball to win the 11th game in a row for a team chasing in this year’s PSL.
The Qalandars did not start the chase of 187 in the right manner with skipper Sohail Akhtar failing once again, getting run out even without facing a ball. Even Mohammad Hafeez, who had been an amazing form prior to this game also got out early today. Joe Denly was cleaned up by a classic inswinger by Mohammad Amir who was on fire in his first spell. It was then that Fakhar Zaman was joined by Ben Dunk, who had been a bad form before this game. The two then added 119 runs for the fifth wicket, taking the game close, which was finished by Weise.
Earlier in the evening, Karachi, who were put to bat first did not have a good start as Shaheen Afridi cleaned up Pak skipper Babar Azam with a breathtaking inswinger. Sharjeel who was dropped by Akhtar at mid-on made good use of the chance and scored a 39 ball 64 with some brilliant shots including a Nataraja six off Ahmed Daniyal. From struggling at 37-3, Karachi made it to 113-4.
Mohammad Nabi and Dan Christian also made useful contributions to take the total to 182 at the end of the 19th. In the last over, Shaheen Afridi gave away only three runs and picked up two wickets to end with match figures 3-27. He was awarded Man of the Match for this performance of his.
This was Qalandar’s third win in four games at the National Stadium in Karachi and it pushed them to the second spot on the Points Table.