• Opener Fakhar Zaman scored his seventh one-day international century to lead Pakistan to victory.
• Babar Azam scored 74 runs before being caught after mistiming a ball.
• The match was the first of a three-game series against the Dutch.

PAK vs NED: Pakistan beat the Netherlands by 16 runs in the first of a three-game series on Tuesday in Rotterdam. Opener Fakhar Zaman scored his seventh one-day international century to lead Pakistan to victory.

Pakistan won the toss and chose to bat on a day when big scores were expected on a slow pitch at the VOC Cricket Club outside the Dutch harbour city.

The tourists, on the other hand, got off to a slow start. After 50 overs, they had a strong score of 314-6.

Even though the Dutch tried hard to get more runs, they ended up with 298-8 against a determined Pakistani team cheered on by a lot of loud fans.

Pakistan’s captain, Babar Azam, said afterward that he was worried at times during the game, which he called “tricky.”

Zaman’s innings, on the other hand, “gave a solid partnership on which we could build,” he said.

Zaman scored 109 runs at a rate of one run per ball, and Azam scored 74 runs before being caught after mistiming a ball from Dutch fast bowler Logan van Beek.

Pakistan’s batting was held back at first by the home team’s bowlers. Danger man Imam-ul-Haq was the first Pakistani batsman to be out. He was run out by fast bowler Vivian Kingma in the sixth over after taking 19 balls to score two.

But Zaman and Azam eventually let loose and put together a score of 168 runs off 170 balls before Azam was caught by Tom Cooper at mid-off when he mistimed a shot.

Zaman was out of the game after two overs, when Dutch captain and wicketkeeper Scott Edwards ran him out with a brilliant throw from deep mid-wicket by Bas de Leede.

Pakistan looked like they were going to get a higher score, but the Dutch bowlers did a good job of keeping them down. The young spin bowlers Aryan Dutt and Tim Pringle caused problems with their bowling.

The Dutch did not play well on the field, though. They dropped a few catches, and Kingma in particular dropped a crucial high ball that gave Zaman a second chance when he was on 43.

When the Dutch were batting second, a fast ball hit Max O’Dowd in the pads and got him out lbw in the second over. This was Naseem Shah’s (3-51) first ODI.

Shah struck again later in the innings. Teja Nidamanuru was out because he pulled a ball onto his stumps, and Pringle was out for a golden duck because he was caught leg before.

Haris Rauf (3-67) took the important wicket of veteran Cooper, who scored 65 runs off 54 balls.

Cooper and 19-year-old Vikramjit Singh Singh (65), who helped steady the Dutch innings with 97 runs, batted together.

Then Edwards hit the ball, and the Dutch needed 48 runs off 24 balls with three overs left.

Even though Edwards hit a heroic 71 off of 60 balls, the Dutch still lost.

“We feel like more and more we are getting ourselves within reach of winning a few games but today we dropped two or three catches. We let ourselves down,” said Edwards.

On Thursday, the second ODI will be played at the VOC cricket ground, and the last game of the series will be played there on Sunday.

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