KARACHI: Islamabad United stars Hussain Talat and Asif Ali were handed their T20I debut caps today as West Indies opted to bowl first against Pakistan in the first of the three-match T20I series at National Stadium.
Former captains Ramiz Raja and Waqar Younis presented the two youngsters with their debut caps ahead of the toss.
A confident and focused Pakistan, currently ranked number 1 in T20I rankings, are expected to dominate the series as they go up against a youthful West Indies side, which is missing many of its key players.
Pakistan captain Sarfraz Ahmed said he was proud and excited to be leading his team on home soil, as international cricket returns to Karachi after a hiatus of nine years.
"It feels great to be playing on our home soil, in front of our home crowd," the skipper said at the toss, adding that the pitch looks good for batting.
He has his eyes on a clean sweep of the West Indies in order to retain the top T20I team ranking.
"Definitely, we [are aiming for] clean sweep, but [we won't be taking West Indies lightly]. Their team is quite strong, their players have been playing a lot of T20 cricket," he said during a press conference on Saturday.
Playing XI
Pakistan XI: Fakhar Zaman, Babar Azam, Shoaib Malik, Asif Ali, Sarfraz Ahmed (c, wk), Hussain Talat, Faheem Ashraf, Mohammad Nawaz, Shadab Khan, Mohammad Amir, Hasan Ali
West Indies XI: Jason Mohammed (c), Andre Fletcher, Rovman Powell, Marlon Samuels, Keemo Paul, Denesh Ramdin (wk), Kesrick Williams, V Permaul, Chadwick Walton, Rayad Emrit, Samuel Badree
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