Daily Times

The Pakistan-born Saad Bin Zafar spun Canada to a 14 runs victory in the first match of the Tri-Nation Twenty20 Cricket Series which kicked off at Maple Leaf North-West Ground, King City here.

Saad Bin Zafar earned the honor of being Canada’s first captain at the T20 World Cup in 2024. That was a culmination of a long career with Canada that started with a first-class debut in 2008 before representing the team consistently in all formats.

As a slow left-arm spinner and left-hand batter, Saad has also been part of the Caribbean Premier League, representing St Lucia Zouks. In November 2021, he entered the record books as the first man to concede no run in a four-over spell in a T20I when he finished with figures of 4-4-0-2 against Panama.

The Nepal skipper won the toss and invited Canada to bat first. Canada while batting first set 123 runs, a meager total, for the loss of eight wickets in the allotted 20 overs.

The Canadian batsmen could not added much to the total with only middle order Shreyas Movva made 22 runs off 23 balls with one boundary and one six, Saad bin Zafar made 23 runs off 18 balls with three boundaries, opener Naveet Dhaliwal (13) off 10 balls with one six, Dilpreet Bajwa (14) off 10 balls with two boundaries, Akhil Kumar not out 14 off 13 balls with one boundary and a six and Perveen Kumar made 19 run off 13 balls with two towering sixes.

The Canadian reached 50 runs in 9.4 overs off 58 balls, followed by Canada’s 100 runs in 17.3 overs off 105 balls only made 123 runs for the loss of eight wickets in 20 overs.