by Abdul Habib
17h April 2010

The third and final T20 practise game between Pakistan and Pakistan A took place on Friday, it was held at the training camp in Lahore. National captain Shahid Afridi was busy in Karachi with the launch of the T20 World Cup so Misbah Ul Haq took over the captaincy of the Pakistan team whilst Mohammad Hafeez captained Pakistan A.

Essentially both teams were Pakistan A teams because both teams were a mix of first team and reserve players. The Akmal brothers were on opposing sides but neither of them did much in this game.

Pakistan A batted first but were in trouble very early as Asif took the wickets of Khalid Latif and Umar Akmal in the first over. Aamer took Umar Amin's wicket and after 15-odd runs Hafeez eventually fell to Aamer as well.

In no time at all Pakistan A were 40-ish runs for 4 wickets requiring a miracle to make a game of this match. Cometh the hour and cometh the man, Fawad Alam stepped up and began to rebuild their innings. Eventually Pakistan A recovered and scored around 145/7 with a big 50 from Fawad Alam.

Pakistan's bowlers did a fantastic job with Asif and Aamer on top, Ajmal and Azam also took a wicket each.

Pakistan went into the chase confidently, after all they were looking at a relatively modest total and were favourites to beat Pakistan A.

But they hadn't reckoned on running into a giant. Unfortunately for them they did.

Irfan opened the bowling for Pakistan A and took 2 wickets in his first over, removing both Salman Butt and Kamran Akmal. Sami came on from the other side but went for 8 or 9 runs. Then Irfan came back and bowled a 3 run over to keep the pressure on Pakistan. Irfan was unlucky not to have more wickets with a couple of catches being dropped off his bowling.

Misbah came out to steady the innings but got a nasty bouncer from Irfan which broke his helmet. The match was stopped as everyone rushed in to check on Misbah's health but afer a short break he was fine to continue. In fact Misbah went on to score a big 50 himself and remained not out in the end.

But Pakistan A's spinners dried up the runs through the middle of the innings with both Hafeez and Rehman taking a wicket each. Misbah got some support from domestic batting legend Naumanullah who'd been drafted in specially to play this game but it wasn't enough. With 24 runs needed off the last over Pakistan fell short by 10 runs.

Another victory for Pakistan A who win this series 2-1