Belted over deep midwicket to seal it for the Sultans! Short and drifting into his pads, Tim stands tall and tonks it high and handsome over the leg-side
Kings vs Sultans, 1st Match at Karachi, PSL, Jan 27 2022 - Ball by Ball Commentary
Sultans won by 7 wickets (with 10 balls remaining)
That's that from ESPNcricinfo's live coverage of the opening game of PSL 2022. We hope you enjoyed our watch and don't forget to tune in again tomorrow. From Raghav, Momin, and Binoy, goodbye and goodnight!
Imran Tahir is the Player of the Match. "I didn't expect the pitch to take turn tonight. In the previous edition there were heaps of runs scored at this venue so it was nice to see that it slightly on a slower side."
We'll have the presentations in a short while.
Qaiser Abbas: "Heartiest congratulations to Pakistan as PSL is underway. A good start for MS as well!"
Faizan Ahmed: "So Rizwan started 2022 right from where he ended 2021. Welcome fifty."
Multan Sultans open their PSL 2022 account with a fairly comprehensible seven-wicket victory. They started sluggishly much like their opposition. But the skipper, Mohammad Rizwan, kept his cool, anchored the innings and saw his side home. Shan Masood and Sohaib Maqsood played decent supporting roles to ensure that runs were never an issue for the defending champions. Karachi Kings' pacers failed to strike up-front and while Nabi tied things down in the latter half of the run-chase, they never had enough runs on the board in the first place to really trouble the men in blue. So, the Sultans draw first blood in this year's edition, an ideal beginning to their title-defense.
Punched down to long-on
The Sultans one hit away now
Good yorker-execution, just outside off, dug out by the skipper
Smoked over extra-cover! Pitched up by Imran, Rizwan shuffles away, opens the face of his bat and expertly lofts it over the off-side, no one stationed there
Lovely slower delivery, pitching on middle and leg, Tim is once again quite early into his defensive prod as it balloons up into the off-side but lands on an empty real estate
Overpitched, wide outside off, Rizwan does well to extend his reach and dig it out
The Sultans finding it hard to close it out quickly
Back of a length, just outside off, carved away towards deep point
Serves up a low full-toss first-up, the batsman has an almighty thrash on it but fails to get any bat on the ball
Hasan: "Poor captaincy from Babar. Taha has been leaking runs and you have Nabi so there was really no reason to keep giving him overs. Also how has Ilyas only bowled one over so far?"
M Imran back into the attack
Driven down to long-on
Pushed through quickly and Tim is slightly early on his back-foot defense, it balloons up into the on-side and just lands in front of Babar positioned at short midwicket
Shuffles across and softly punches it in front of the short midwicket fielder
Drifting in with the angle, flipped across the line
Short of a length, nudged into the leg-side
Pushed through by Nabi, Rizwan leans back and looks to work it on the on-side but gets thudded on his back-pad instead. Loud appeal from the bowler and the wicket-keeper but Richard Illingworth is unmoved. Babar decides to go upstairs yet again. It's pitching in-line but the impact is umpire's call so Rizwan survives! Looked pretty adjacent to the naked eye, to be fair.
Shuffles across to this tossed up delivery and sweeps aerially; the backward square leg fielder runs across to his left to gobble it but fails to keep hold of it
Pushed through quicker, thrashed through the off-side for just one
In-dart, clipped sweetly towards wide long-on
Short and wide again, hangs back and cracks it to short cover
Shortish, outside off, looks to carve it away but gets a thick bottom-edge that goes past the wicket-keeper
Floated up on middle and leg, blocked down the ground
Over 19 • MS 126/3
Sultans won by 7 wickets (with 10 balls remaining)