LAHORE: Australia beat Pakistan by 115 runs in the third and deciding Test of the recently concluded Benaud-Qadir Trophy at the back of Nathan Lyon’s heroics, who bagged five wickets in the fourth innings, here on Friday.
In the final session of the final day, Pakistan were jolted by a massive blow as the skipper Babar Azam, who was fighting hard with his gritty knock also fell victim to Lyon. He perished in the 84th over after scoring 55 off 104 balls with the help of six boundaries.
Following his dismissal, the batting tail could not do much against the strong Australian bowling attack and the home side, in the end, bowled out for 235; handing the touring side a resounding 115 runs victory.
Earlier, the home side Pakistan experienced a disastrous second session as the side collapsed from 142/2 to 167/5 with the top-scorer Imam-ul-Haq, alongside Fawad Alam, and Mohammad Rizwan making their way back to the pavilion.
Imam remained the top scorer for the home side with 70 runs in 199 deliveries, while Babar followed back with a gritty 55. The rest of the batters, on the other hand, could not manage to score significantly.
In the morning, Pakistan resumed at an overnight score of 73/0, the set pair of Abdullah Shafique and Imam broke as the former walked back to the pavilion without scoring a run on the fifth day.
Abdullah scored 27 off 80 balls with the help of three boundaries and a six before Cameron Green dismissed him in the fourth over of the morning session.
Azhar Ali then arrived at the crease and put on a brief partnership with Imam. The pair could only add 28 runs for the second wicket before the former perished on Nathan Lyon’s delivery. The right-handed batter scored 17 off 47 deliveries.
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