Salman Ali Agha’s gamble works as Abhishek Sharma falls for second consecutive Duck in T20 World Cup
India and Pakistan are up against each other in their third group A match at the ongoing T20 World Cup taking place on February 15 (Sunday) in Colombo.
India-Pakistan encounters were known for the battle between Indian batters and Pakistani bowlers. However, ahead of the 2026 T20 World Cup encounter between the two arch rivals, the conversation completely changed to Pakistani spin attack’s usefulness against a super aggressive Indian batting unit.
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Pakistani captain Salman Ali Agha took the matter into his own hands after he chose to bowl first in Colombo in the Group A clash between the two sides on Sunday. Agha came up to open the bowling and with two Indian hard-hitters in prime form, this could have resulted in a massive over as well with Agha not being a frontline spinner.
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However, Agha’s large-heartedness brought immediate result and Abhishek Sharma mistimed the ball straight into the hands of mid-on to get out for Duck in his second successive t20 World Cup match.
Why Agha chose to open the bowling for Pakistan?
Despite having a plethora of spin-bowling options at his disposal, Agha took the ball himself to start against an aggressive Indian pairing of Abhishek and Ishan Kishan. The gamble could have backfired but it did not.
Why did he do it? Well the answer was quite visible on the very first ball of the next over.
Shaheen Shah Afridi, Pakistan’s only front-line pacer playing this match, came up to bowl against Kishan who dispatched him all the way over the mid-wicket fence for a six. The left-arm pacer leaked 15 runs in that over.
Since the pitch at R Premadasa was assisting spin, Agha probably tried to limit the overs of pace by giving himself the first over. The attempt could likely have been to increase his spin options and further delay the entry of his other specialist spinners.
As stated above, it was a gamble that could have gone either way but ended up going in favour of Pakistan.
Meanwhile, Abhishek endured another failure in this World Cup. He was out for a Golden Duck against USA and now got out for a four-ball Duck against Pakistan. This now becomes his fourth Duck in last six international innings.
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