Fakhar's 127, Minhas-Nawaz's 94-run stand and Shaheen's last-ball six: Pakistan beat Sri Lanka by three wickets

Pakistan chased down 326 with three wickets in hand to beat Sri Lanka in this tri-series fixture, but the margin flatters them. They lost their first two wickets at 14, lost two more with just two runs needed, and needed Shaheen Afridi to clear the boundary rope to finish the job. Sri Lanka made 325 for eight. They were 255 for two after 41 overs and then lost six wickets in the last nine overs, a collapse that decided the shape of the game. The arithmetic behind the total holds together cleanly: 255 at the 41-over mark, 70 more runs for six wickets, a target of 326. Kamindu Mendis made 131, his career-best, more than doubling his previous best score. Pavan Rathnayake added 77 and has had a prolific tournament, with 427 runs so far — though that figure rests on just four dismissals, which makes his average of 106.75 look far more imposing than it is. One detail worth flagging: Rathnayake was not at the crease when Sri Lanka reached 255 in the 41st over. He had already been dismissed for 77. It was someone else batting with Kamindu at that point, and the scorecard says so plainly even if the narrative smooths it over. Pakistan's reply began badly. Maaz fell for one, and Babar Azam departed without scoring — the second wicket, at 14. The batsman expected to anchor the chase was gone before he could settle. Saad Baig made 74, his first international half-century, and it came hours before his 20th birthday. It arrived at a moment when the innings needed exactly that. Fakhar Zaman made 127, but the scorecard does not tell the whole of it. He was dropped on 6, on 69 and again on 106. Maheesh Theekshana put him down twice. Had any one of those chances been taken, the match would have looked very different. He was also dismissed for 106 — before the chase was complete — so crediting the win entirely to his innings does not survive contact with the facts. After Fakhar, Minhas and Nawaz put on 94, and that stand pulled Pakistan out of trouble. It was decisive, but it did not secure the game, as the two wickets that fell with two runs still needed make clear. It made the finish easier; it did not remove the danger. At one stage Pakistan needed 46 from 30 balls. One over brought 15 and eased the pressure, but the account of the overs after that is not available, so it is impossible to reconstruct how the game swung back. With two runs required, Minhas and Faheem fell in quick succession. Seven wickets were down, three remained, and Shaheen Afridi hit the ball over the fence to end it. With the ball, Shaheen did the heavier lifting earlier in the day, dismissing Kamindu Mendis and Shanaka at a stage when Sri Lanka were scoring freely. Haris Rauf took two late wickets with a short-ball plan. Pakistan took six wickets in the last nine overs, and that is the single hardest number in support of the comeback story. Yet no individual bowling figures appear anywhere. No overs, no runs conceded. Minhas's left-arm spin is described as expensive without saying how expensive. The reader is left to accept the writer's assessment rather than measure it. Four days before this match, Pakistan were bowled out for 110. The same side then chased 326. No explanation for the change is offered — no mention of selection, no mention of approach. The contrast is used as a rhetorical device rather than treated as a question. This was a tri-series fixture, and the third team is never named in the source report. Readers are left to infer the composition of the tournament. There are also no quotes at all, from anyone, anywhere in the piece — no captain, no coach, no post-match press conference, no reference to an official scorecard. The result is a Pakistan win by three wickets, built on Fakhar's 127, Baig's 74, the Minhas-Nawaz stand and Shaheen's contribution with both bat and ball. Fakhar's innings was the largest single part of it, but it rested on three reprieves; take one of those catches and the story would read differently.