Rankings Don't Matter On The Pitch: Gloucestershire Cricket Troll Babar Azam Following His Struggles In The 2020 Vitalty Blast
Babar Azam [Photo-Twitter]

Babar Azam, Pakistan white-ball and the erstwhile No.1 ranked T20I batsman in the world, seems to be having a difficult time in his ongoing stint with Somerset in the 2020 Vitality T20 Blast.

Aazam, who stayed back in the United Kingdom, following Pakistan’s tour of England, started off the tournament with a 35-ball 42 against Worcestershire but since then his performances have stunningly nose-dived, giving a clear indication that the stylish young batsman might just be out of sorts currently.

Babar Azam has recorded scores of 6,0 and 10 in his last three innings. He scored a painstaking 17-ball 10 against Gloucestershire, where he consistently failed to clear the circle, especially against pacer David Payne.

Babar scored a mere six runs off the 10 balls that he faced against David Payne before he was eventually dismissed by the left-arm seamer.

Also Read- Kamran Akmal Defends Babar Azam After Latter’s Performance In England

Babar Azam has managed 58 runs in his 4 Vitality Blast 2020 outings for Somerset

Babar Azam
Babar Azam. Image Credits: Twitter

Babar Azam was eventually dismissed in an attempt to clear the circle, mistiming a half-volley straight to Jack Taylor at mid-off. Following his struggles against David Payne, Gloucestershire Cricket Twitter handle posted the video of the duel before cheekily captioning it as ‘Rankings don’t matter on the pitch’

Following Babar Azam’s dismissal, Will Smeed took the charge of Somerset’s run-chase as he smashed a whirlwind 49-ball 82- an innings which included five sixes and six fours. Lewis Gregory too chipped in with a handy by 21-ball 38 before Gloucestershire eventually closed off the game with an 11-run victory.

Meanwhile, Babar Azam has also lost his numero-uno spot in the ICC T20I rankings for batsmen to England’s Dawid Malan, following the brilliant form of the latter.

Babar Azam hasn’t had a good English summer thus far. He did score three half-centuries [two in Tests and one in T20I] in the recently concluded series but the talented batsman wasn’t able to convert those scores into big hundreds, something that is a hallmark of a great batsman.

The Pakistan superstar will be hoping to regain his form and finish off the summer on the high before he heads back to his country for the series against Zimbabwe and PSL playoffs.