The first wicket of the the 2025 Asia Cup Super Fours match between India and Pakistan was met with displeasure by those in the latter camp and former Pakistan players in the commentary box alike. Opener Farkhar Zaman started aggressively, hitting two consecutive fours against Jasprit Bumrah in his first over. The intentions were clear to take on the bowlers from the beginning. However, his innings was cut short after Sanju Samson caught him behind the wicket in Hardik Pandya’s second over.
While Samson looked pretty confident, replays showed that it wasn’t exactly a clear call. Hardik’s off cutter found the edge of Fakhar’s bat and Samson immediately claimed the catch. The on-field umpires referred it to the third umpire to check the legitimacy of the catch. The ball was very close to the ground when Samson caught it. After checking the replays couple of times, once with the zoomed-in angle, the third umpire was convinced and ruled it out.
Watch the dismissal here:
Wickets ka 𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐃𝐈𝐊 swaagat, yet again 🤩
Hardik Pandya nicks one off Fakhar Zaman 🔥
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However, Zaman and the rest of the Pakistani camp including coach Mike Hesson seemed to be pretty incensed by that decision. Pakistan fast bowling great Waqar Younis also seemed unconvinced while calling the sequence of events from the commentators’ box. “I think I would want to see the replays more times as it looked to me that the ball bounced,” Waqar said on the commentary. “That is why Fakhar was shocked,” former India batter Sanjay Manjarekar, co-commentating with Waqar, later said. “The opinion in the commentary box is divided on whether it was a wicket or not.”
India had earlier won the toss and chosen to bowl first in Dubai. Suryakumar said at the toss that India are bringing back Jasprit Bumrah and Varun Chakravarthy for the game. There was significant speculation over whether Axar Patel would be fit for this game but he is also included in the playing XI. Agha also said that his side has made two changes with Faheem Ashraf and Hussain Talat replacing Hasan Nawaz and Khushdil Shah.
