Pakistan’s Fakhar Zaman continued his record-breaking spree with the bat in the ongoing ODI series against Zimbabwe. On Sunday, in the fifth ODI in Bulawayo, Zaman became the fastest man to reach 1000 runs in one-day internationals. The left-handed opening batsman took 18 innings to reach the milestone and broke Sir Vivian Richards’ record, who completed 1000 ODI runs in 21 innings.
Zaman came into the fifth and final ODI with 980 runs from 17 innings and achieved the feat when he cut Tendai Chatara for a boundary to get from 17 to 21.
Apart from Richards, the record of 21 innings was held jointly by five batsmen, with Pakistan’s Babar Azam the last one to join the club. Kevin Pietersen, Jonathan Trott, Quinton de Kock are the other three batsmen who used to hold the record.
Earlier on Friday, Zaman became the first Pakistani batsman to score a double hundred in ODI. In the same match he was also part of a world record partnership of 304 runs with Imam ul Haq for the opening wicket. The Pakistani opening have added over 600 runs as batting partners in the series to become the first ever batting pair to add 600 plus runs in partnerships during a bilateral ODI series.
Zaman is having a memorable ODI series against Zimbabwe and has recorded scores of 60, 117*, 43* and 210* prior to the fifth ODI.
The 28-year-old made his ODI debut in 2017 in the ICC Champions Trophy where he scored 252 runs in four innings, which also included a crucial 106-ball 114 in the final against India, which Pakistan won by 180 runs.
In his 18 innings till now, Zaman has managed to score 1065 runs at an average of 76.07, which includes one double century, three centuries and six half-centuries.
For India, captain Virat Kohli holds the record for being the fastest Indian to cross the 1000-run mark after he took 24 innings to reach the milestone.
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