Babar Azam and Azhar Ali on a Record Breaking Run

The whitewash also helped Pakistan improve their ODI ranking to 8, making their path to the World Cup in 2019 a little bit easier.

Pakistan’s impressive limited overs performances over the past month has got a lot to do with a new look top order comprising Azhar Ali, Sharjeel Khan, and Babar Azam in ODIs and the latter two with Khalid Latif in T20s.

Babar Azam especially has been extremely special. His batting has been so magical that it has entertained our neighbors as well.

Babar created a number of records during this series and is also on the verge of creating some others. Here is a look at what Babar has managed to do in his young ODI career.

1. Most ODI Runs after 18 innings

Babar has now scored 886 runs in 18 ODI innings. That is the highest tally for any ODI batsman ever, breaking Sir Viv Richards’ tally of 883 runs in as many innings.

That is some name to be mentioned with in the same sentence.

2. Third Consecutive ODI Hundred

Only two batsmen from Pakistan, Zaheer Abbas and Saeed Anwar, and 5 other international batsmen, had managed this feat before Babar Azam.

He is now the 8th batsman to do so and the second youngest after Quinton de Kock.

Babar’s tally of 360 is the second highest, after Gibb’s 385 for 3 consecutive centuries in ODIs.

It is quite amusing to see India’s name appear so many times in this table above.

3. Most Runs in a 3-match ODI Series

Babar’s 360 runs in the 3 ODIs against the West Indies broke Quinton de Kock’s record of the most runs score in a 3-match ODI series.

4. Fastest to 3 ODI Centuries for Pakistan

Nasir Jamshed scored his 3rd ODI hundred in his 21st innings. Saeed Anwar had done so in his 33rd.

Babar has done the same in 18 ODI innings. getting there faster than any other batsman from Pakistan.

5. Fastest to 1,000 ODI Runs

The fastest to the feat have been Sir Viv Richards, Kevin Pietersen, Jonathan Trott, and Quinton de Kock, who got there in 21 ODI innings.

With Babar only 114 runs away from the 1,000 run mark, he can break this record if he gets there in his next 2 ODI innings. He can equal it if he takes 3 innings for another 114 ODI runs.

I reckon he can get there in his next innings!

For perspective, it took Virat Kohli 24 innings.

Babar is not the only one who created records during this series against the West Indies.

Pakistan’s ODI captain, Azhar Ali, who produced his third ODI century in the final match of the series after disappointing in the first 2 ODIs, became the first captain from Pakistan to score 3 ODI centuries.

I was quite surprised at this given that batsmen like Javed Miandad and Inzamam Ul Haq have captained Pakistan in many ODIs.

It is shocking to note that Javed Miandad never scored an ODI century while captaining Pakistan.

Inzamam’s and Shahid Afridi’s two centuries as captain were the highest tally before Azhar’s third.

Extraordinary!

Exciting times for Pakistan’s ODI cricket with Babar Azam batting like a master and Azhar Ali leading them to clean sweeps and a notch higher in the rankings.