Latham and Young’s Hundred Storm That Swept Pakistan Away in Champions Trophy Opener 2025 .

PAKISTAN VS NEW ZEALAND , 1ST MATCH, KARACHI ,ICC CHAMPION TROPHY  , 2025 : Latham and Young’s Hundred Storm That Swept Pakistan Away in Champions Trophy Opener 2025 .

Will Young and Tom Latham hit solid hundreds as New Zealand continued their recent ascendancy over hosts Pakistan with a commanding 60-run victory in the Champions Trophy opener in Karachi on Wednesday. Young forged a key partnership scoring 107 off 113 balls, as Latham anchored the innings with an unbeaten 118 off 104 that guided the Black Caps to 320 for five after they were put in to bat by Pakistan. Phillips’ blistering 61 off just 39 balls also helped the Kiwis cross the 300-run mark after a slow start. Latham and Young’s Hundred Storm That Swept Pakistan Away in Champions Trophy Opener 2025 .

TOSS-

Pakistan won the toss and chose to bowl .

TEAMS LINE UP-

PAKISTAN-

Fakhar Zaman, Babar Azam, Saud Shakeel, Mohammad Rizwan (c & wk), Salman Agha, Tayyab Tahir, Khushdil Shah, Shaheen Afridi, Naseem Shah, Haris Rauf, Abrar Ahmed

NEW ZEALAND-

Devon Conway, Will Young, Kane Williamson, Daryl Mitchell, Tom Latham (wk), Glenn Phillips, Michael Bracewell, Mitchell Santner (c), Nathan Smith, Matt Henry, William O’Rourke

NEW ZEALAND-

New Zealand had the better of the first-hand exchanges, before Shaheen Afridi and Naseem Shah managed not much lateral movement in the air nor off the surface. Young drove square off Thomson for three then clipped a few friendly deliveries around his pads for boundaries as 30 runs arrived in the first five overs. Shaded from overhead light in the twilight of an evening match, Rizwan summoned Abrar Ahmed in the sixth over and the leg spinner had his reward in just his ninth ball as a slider trapped Devon Conway’s front leg and uprooted his off stump. Pakistan doubled down on that breakthrough with the very next over seeing Naseem having Kane Williamson feather an edge to the ‘keeper. Daryl Mitchell found it difficult to adjust to the pace and bounce off the pitch and was forced on a pull shot by the returning Haris Rauf, leaving New Zealand at 73 for 3 in the 17th over. When Latham joined him to do the recovery job, 49 of those runs had come off Young’s bat.

The pair then put together a fine 118-run partnership without ever really looking like having got out of third gear. As Young drove and cut with panache, the runs flowed unabated; Latham played his patented sweep confidently against the spinners. The two batters ran hard between the wickets and also rotated the strike. The only hiccup in the stand came when Rauf was brought back for a spell and bowled a series of pacy short balls that reared up at Latham. The sequence consisted of a burnt review for a caught behind, a tough catch put down – Latham was 41 – and another ball that was awkwardly fended away but away from the onrushing bowler.

Young brought up his century with a single off his 107th delivery to become only the fourth New Zealand batter to score a Champions Trophy 100. Latham reached his eighth ODI hundred 15 balls quicker than his partner, smashing 10 fours and three sixes in his innings and his second fifty off just 31 balls as New Zealand pressed the advantage of the platform set by the pair. Latham was also helped in this effort along by a terrific cameo from Glenn Phillips, who hit four sixes in a 39-ball 61. The last 10 overs yielded 113 runs and gave New Zealand 320, a total that once seemed out of reach during its shaky start.

PAKISTAN –

Although Zaman had no right to be batting up there after he copped an injury but for Pakistan it made absolute sense to set an aggressive pace and send shockwaves of intent around the tournament. Instead, O’Rourke took two of them, and they could manage to limped their way to 22 for 2 at the end of the 10 overs. Shakeel fell to a loose attempted cut which carried to third man, but Rizwan’s wicket was entirely, rewarded for his agility by plucking out a sensational diving catch at backward point to remove the Pakistan captain.

Zaman came out to bat at No.4 and was severely limited in his mobility and running between the wickets. Stringy odd that Babar Azam never attempted to get the 02 off spinners – Michael Bracewell and Phillips – working in tandem. The first 17 overs of the chase saw Pakistan playing as many as 75 dot balls, and then they also let the asking rate creep upward of eight runs an over after some of the early early stages of the chase. It turned out that the expected dew never arrived and New Zealand’s spinners found twice the amount of spin as their Pak counterparts, their third seamer Nathan Smith not used until the 31st over.

Zaman managed a few boundaries before Bracewell castled him. Babar reached 50 but the 64 he scored came at a strike-rate of 71. That meant, around him, batters needed to keep finding ways to regularly hit the ball to catch up with the asking rate. Salman Ali Agha scored 42 off 28 and Khushdil Shah scored handsomely for his 69 off 49, but they were always taking one risk too many and they paid the price for the dearth of intent at the start of the chase. O’Rourke and Santner both picked up three wickets each as the Pakistan challenge had ended with 16 balls still remaining in the game.

Brief scores:

New Zealand 320/5 in 50 overs (Tom Latham 118*, Will Young 107; Naseem Shah 2-63) beat Pakistan 260 in 47.2 overs (Khushdil Shah 69, Babar Azam 64; Will O’Rourke 3-47, Mitchell Santner  3-66) by 60 runs.