New Delhi: Pakistan has beaten Australia in a T20I match for the first time in eight years. Pakistani cricket fans are surprised, but they are also angry. And their anger is directed at one person: Babar Azam.
Pakistan won by 22 runs in the first T20 match out of three held at the Gaddafi Stadium, Lahore Thursday, and Azam scored the lowest: 24 off 20 balls.
He was a major disappointment for Pakistanis—the only role he seems to be playing consistently. His batting and bowling were both heavily criticised in classic Pakistani humour.
“It’s so unfair that he was forced to bat at no.4. We all agree that his best position is on the bench,” Areeba Chaudhry wrote.
For X user Assad, Azam’s performance was business as usual. “A typical Babar outing, came in, wasted the momentum, played dot balls, dragged down the run rate and got out,” the post read.
X user @namaloomafraaad went on an entire rant against Pakistani cricketers.
“Pakistani cricketers need to prioritise the team’s interest over their own careers. babar knows he isn’t built for t20s, fakhar knows his career is done, shadab’s also kinda dusted. paisay bhi kama chukay ho bhai jaan chorr dou team ki kitna zaleel karao ge (You’ve earned money, too, leave the team, how much more will you insult us),” read the post.
The cricket fan also had suggestions: “Replace fakhar with hasan nawaz & babar with honestly anyone & fly the team to srilanka,” he wrote.
Even Pakistani actor Arsalan Nazeer offered his two cents of humour: “Internet Buffering from the 90s had better flow than Pakistani batting!”
X user Shaheen analysed the cricketer’s catches and claimed that he does everything for the camera.
dropping down unnecessarily after the first catch and now doing the performative bunny hops despite being 15 meters inside the boundary to make it look like a good catch. babar azam you're just a player for the cameras.
— ħ (@shaheenhive) January 29, 2026
Azam was called back from the finals of the Big Bash League in Sydney for this T201. His form wasn’t great in the BBL either, where he scored 202 runs at a strike rate of roughly 103 for the Sidney Sixers before returning home.
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Azam’s ‘bizarre’ dismissal
At the Thursday match, Azam’s dismissal unfolded in a “bizarre fashion”, discussed even in Australian newspapers. The story included a dog, for some reason.
Australian bowler Adam Zampa had Azam out front attempting a reverse sweep, but Azam was initially given not out. Australia instantly reviewed, and that’s when things got strange.
The third umpire appeared confused by Azam’s reversed stance, twice insisting the ball had pitched outside leg stump. Only after being reminded by the on-field umpire that Babar is a right-hander did he take another look.
And despite ball-tracking clearly showing the delivery smashing into the stumps, the third umpire initially advised sticking with the not-out call—moments before he instructed it be overturned to out.
To top it all off, a dog could be heard barking in the background as the umpire requested the second replay. The match had other dramatic moments, too, when Azam’s fans reportedly beat up a man who had criticised him.
No one expected Pakistan to win—including the Pakistanis. So when Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif congratulated the team on its ‘electrifying’ performance, most Pakistanis could not resist taking a dig.
“This is completely uncalled for.A win in a meaningless bilateral series against a weakened Australian team, and the Prime Minister thinks it’s appropriate to tweet about it and blow it up into something huge? This country is doomed because we always celebrate mediocrity,” Mishal wrote.
Another wanted the prime minister to be engaged in matters of true importance. “Asim Munir? Give this man a job. Lol,” he wrote.
(Edited by Prasanna Bachchhav)