Sikandar Raza created history by breaking the records of Gayle and McCullum: Sikandar Raza has become the first batsman in the world to score 5 consecutive half-centuries in T20I cricket. Before him, explosive batsmen like Chris Gayle and Bendon McCullum had achieved this feat 4 times each.
Zimbabwe captain Sikandar Raza has created history by scoring a half-century in the first T20I against Sri Lanka. This is Raza's 5th half-century in 5 consecutive innings in T20I cricket. He has become the first batsman in the world to score so many consecutive half-centuries in this format. Yes, earlier this record was held by the West Indies and New Zealand.
The names of explosive batsmen were Chris Gayle and Brendon McCullum who had scored 4 consecutive half-centuries in their career. Apart from him, South Africa's Reeza Hendricks also has the record of scoring 4 consecutive half-centuries. However, despite his amazing performance, Sikandar Raza could not lead the team to victory.
Talking about the performance of Sikandar Raza in the last five T20I matches, he has shone in batting as well as bowling, he has taken at least 2 wickets in all these 5 matches.
In the match against Rwanda on 27 November, Sikandar Raza, along with playing an inning of 58 runs, also took three wickets at the expense of 3 runs. After this, a similar performance was repeated against Nigeria (65 runs and 2/13) on 29 November and against Kenya (82 runs and 2/21) on 30 November.
He scored his last half-century of 2023 against Ireland on 7 December. During this period, apart from scoring 65 runs, he also took 3 wickets. Now against Sri Lanka on January 14, 2024, Raza scored his fifth consecutive half-century and played an innings of 62 runs, during which he also took 3 wickets.
If we talk about Sri Lanka vs Zimbabwe in the first T20I, after losing the toss, the Zimbabwe team came to bat first and put 143 runs on the board based on the half-century of the captain. The host team chased this score with 3 wickets left on the last ball. Angelo Mathews played a brilliant inning of 46 runs in 36 balls for which he was awarded the Player of the Match award.
