LAHORE: Pakistan cricketer Khurram Manzoor celebrates his 36th birthday on Friday (today). Born on 10th June 1986, Manzoor, who represented Pakistan from 2008 to 2016, made an attacking 73 on first-class debut against Peshawar at the age of 16. He drifted off the scene for a couple of years, but came back strongly for Karachi Whites in the 2004-05 season, scoring close to 500 runs with two hundreds. That sparked his push to the fringes of the national squad, where Pakistan struggled constantly to find a stable opening pair. An aggressive opener with a stance not too dissimilar to Ijaz Ahmed’s — backside jutting out and legs planted wide apart — Manzoor came into national reckoning finally after scoring over 1,000 runs at 53.9 in the first half of the 2007-08 season. He played for Pakistan A against Australia A, before being drafted into Pakistan’s squad for the final ODI against Zimbabwe in January 2008. He duly made his international debut in Sheikhupura, marking it with an impressive fifty. In 2009, Manzoor had been not out on 59 overnight in his second Test when it had to be scrapped after the Sri Lankan team bus was attacked by terrorists in Lahore. On Pakistan’s disastrous 2009-10 tour of Australia, Manzoor batted for six hours, trying unsuccessfully to save the Hobart Test. But his best innings came against South Africa in October 2013, when he scored 146 and shared an opening century stand with Shan Masood in Abu Dhabi. Pakistan won the Test by seven wickets. Manzoor played his last Test on 14 August 2014 vs Sri Lanka, last ODI on 24 January 2009 vs Sri Lanka and last T20I on 2 March 2016 vs Bangladesh.