Match Details
Mohammed Rizwan, Multan captain: “The pitch was tough, we had to adopt to the condition and I played a conservative innings. Wickets were also falling and the Tests are coming up. Yes we experimented with both batting and bowling with the playoffs in mind. Yes we have broken the record of nine wins today but we are not taking that into account. We are going one match at a time especially with the final stages coming up and focusing on our processes.
So Multan Sultans, the league leaders, have picked up another convincing win, this time over Islamabad United by a comfortable six wickets with almost three overs to spare. The Sultans, who bowled first, restricted their rivals to a mere 105 runs with a consummate bowling display. And despite early some early hick-ups, chased down the target comfortably with skipper Mohammed Rizwan (51 off 42) anchoring the innings with aplomb and getting fine support from David Willey who remained unbeaten on 28.
Things might have turned out differently with chinaman Liam Dawson bowling a fine spell and picking up figures of 3/16. At 18/3 in the fifth over, the Sultans seemed to be in for a tense chase. All that changed with Tim David blasting his way to a very quick 17 that really unshackled the team and helped Rizwan and Willey set up the fine match-winning partnership.
But the win owed largely to the excellent bowling performance by the defending champions. United won the toss and were quickly ruing their decision having been shackled by tight bowling. They weren't helped by the fact that the dynamic captain Shadab Khan was missing in action further depleting an already weakened team. Asif Afridi opened the bowling and got figures of 2/21 and Willey, Dahani and even David all got wickets. But the pick of the bowlers was the wily veteran Imran Tahir, still on the top of his game and art who bowled a wonderful spell of leg spin to get pick up figures of 2/8 that really broke the backbone of the team. At one point United went 44 balls without a boundary and their first six was hit by Musa very late in the innings whose 26 actually helped them reach double figures. But it was never going to be enough with the strength in depth of the Sultans' batting and they romped home to an easy win.