Sialkot Stallions snatched an impressive eight wickets win to claim the Faysal Bank Super Eight T-20 Cup for the seventh time at the Pindi Stadium, Rawalpindi. Sialkot Stallions defeated Karachi Dolphins on Sunday to maintain its hegemony in the shorter version of the game. Stallions, led by former Pakistan captain Shoaib Malik, achieved the score of 170 with seven balls to spare. Malik played a captain’s innings of 62 to leave Dolphins bowlers totally at disarray. He was supported by Haris Sohail at the other end with a brilliant innings of 55 runs.
Both these batsmen timed 13 fours while Haris shared two valuable stands in the win – one with Malik of 119 runs and the other with Imran Nazir. Stallions got a rapid-fire boost from Imran Nazir, who hammered 41 runs while opening the innings and he along with Haris added 45 runs for the second wicket. Nazir in his 25 minutes stay at the crease cracked six four and two sixes and faced just 20 balls. He consolidated the innings after Shakeel Ansar was run out for just 6 runs. It was Sialkot Stallions, which played with an average of 9.02 runs per over, got to seventh final in their previous T20 Cup they defeated Rawalpindi Rams by ten runs after an interesting contest in the final played at the National Stadium Karachi.
Earlier in the semi-final Karachi beat Lahore Lions by seven wickets and Sialkot defeated Peshawar panthers by 40 runs. Karachi Dolphins cracked 167 for eight in allotted 20 overs with Khalid Latif getting unbeaten 81 runs. Shahzaib Hasan and Khalid provided Karachi strong footing by their 38 runs opening wicket stand and later Khalid joined by Asad Shafiq added another 90 runs for the third wicket. In the process Asad got to 38 runs before being run out. Hasan Raza was the pick of the bowler with four wickets.