So the day has come. Lahore Qalandars faced off against Peshawar Zalmi in the second eliminator match of HBL PSL season 8. If Lahore won, then they will be playing their second consecutive PSL finale. It will be a replay of 2022. While if the Zalmis win, they will be aiming to win their second HBL PSL title. Well, whatever happens, this is going to be a great match.
It is a bad thing that you couldn’t watch the matches. Well, do not worry, we have a whole playlist of all the match highlights that you can read. You just have to go to our website and search for the match you want to read about. Not only will you know the scorecards, but also you will read our fun take on the match.
You can check out PSL 9 Drafts Players List 2024 with PSL 9 Schedule 2024 PDF as well.
Match details
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| GADDAFI STADIUM LAHORE | |
| Match | Lahore Qalandars v Peshawar Zalmi |
| Date | Friday, March 17, 2023 |
| Time | 7:00 PM |
| Match number | 33 |
| Umpires | Ahsan Raza |
| Martin Saggers | |
| TV Umpire | Rashid Riaz |
| Reserve Umpire | Faisal Afridi |
| Match Referee | Roshan Mahanama |
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Toss
Peshawar won the toss and they decided to bat first. A good idea as they do not want to chase under the pressure of the top-quality bowling lineup of the Qalandars.
Squad
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| PESHAWAR ZALMI | LAHORE QALANDARS |
| Saim Ayub | Mirza Baig |
| Babar Azam | Fakhar Zaman |
| Mohammad Haris | Ahsan Hafeez |
| Tom Kohler-Cadmore | Abdullah Shafique |
| Bhanuka Rajapaksa | Sam Billings |
| Aamer Jamal | Sikandar Raza |
| Haseebullah Khan | David Wiese |
| Wahab Riaz, | Shaheen Shah Afridi |
| Azmatullah Omarzai | Rashid Khan |
| Mujeeb Ur Rahman | Haris Rauf |
| Salman Irshad | Zaman Khan |
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First innings
- So the tale starts with the openers Saim and Babar. Unfortunately, the opening stand couldn’t last for long as Zaman Khan bowled Saim out for 9 runs only.
- It was on Babar and Haris now. They did a wonderful job putting the team in a good spot.
- But the star of the show was Haris as Babar played the anchoring role.
- Haris scored 85 runs for just 54 deliveries. This was an excellent batting display.
- But the team couldn’t do much after Babar and Haris got out
- In the end, it was Bhanuka who posted 25 runs to steer the team to a good total. The Zalmis have lacked behind what they could post.
- Among the bowlers, Zaman did a good job while the star bowlers like Rashid and Shaheen went expensive. Maybe the Zalmis did their homework right. Unfortunately, Zaman came out of the syllabus.
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| PESHAWAR ZALMI 171-5 | |
| BATTING | BOWLING |
| Mohammad Haris 85(54) | Zaman Khan 2-20 |
| Babar Azam 42(36) | Rashid Khan 2-42 |
| Bhanuka Rajapaksa 25(18) | Shaheen Shah Afridi 1-41 |
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Second innings
- So the chase begins, and it began with a bang.
- Mirza Baig played a heroic inning of 54 runs that led the team to victory.
- Unfortunately, he was the only batter who played responsibly as his fellow batsmen went out not making many contributions.
- Small cameos from Sam and Sikandar did the trick and QALANDARS WON THE MATCH.
- In the end, it was the skipper who hit 12 runs off of 4 deliveries and took his team to a second consecutive PSL finale.
- Among the bowlers, Azmatullah did try to control the opposition, but he was the only one who put up a fight.
Read:- PSL Winner
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| LAHORE QALANDARS 176-6 | |
| BATTING | BOWLING |
| Mirza Baig 54(42) | Azmatullah Omarzai 2-31 |
| Sam Billings 28(21) | Wahab Riaz 1-20 |
| Sikandar Raza 23(14) | Aamer Jamal 1-32 |
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Man of the match
Mirza Baig won the Man of the Match award. The total wasn’t much. However, if he didn’t push through, the team would have been robbed of the chance to play the PSL finale. They have the chance to make history and become the first team in PSL ever to defend their title successfully.
What about the finale?
Lahore will be playing Multan Sultans in the finale. Will it be an action replay of the 2022 finale? Who knows. The defending champions would like that. But, the Sultans have been in their top form since the beginning of this tournament. Not only do they have the top batsman on their squad, but their two bowlers also rank 1 and 2 in the HBL PSL’s wicket-takers list. It will be an interesting match to see
And hold on, the good news is that you can watch the PSL finale a day earlier. Because of the rain chances on 19 March 2023, the finale has been shifted to 18 March.