Australia vs Pakistan 2024 1st ODI: THIS Sunrisers Hyderabad star returns to international cricket in style, ensures thrilling win over PAK

Australian captain Pat Cummins last played an ODI match nearly a year back – on November 19, 2023, a day every Indian cricket fan wants to forget. It was the 2023 ODI World Cup final, which Australia went on to win by defeating Rohit Sharma’s Team India.

Now, nearly a year on and playing their first ODI match since that World Cup win, the world champions posted a nerve-wracking two-wicket win over Pakistan in the first ODI of the three-match series at the iconic Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) on Monday (November 4).

The architect of the win was Australia and Sunrisers Hyderabad captain Pat Cummins, who scored an unbeaten 32 off 31 balls with four boundaries after the ODI world champs were reduced to 185 for 8 while chasing 204 runs to win.

 

– Captain.
– 32*(32) with bat.
– 2 wickets with ball.

THIS IS PAT CUMMINS ERA IN WORLD CRICKET pic.twitter.com/zqeI83QptT

— Johns. (@CricCrazyJohns) November 4, 2024

For the visitors, Haris Rauf did the maximum damage – claiming 3/67 in 9 over including a double-wicket over in which he dismissed Marnus Labuschagne for 16 and Glenn Maxwell for a golden duck.

Cummins led SRH to the IPL 2024 final earlier this year, where they lost to Kolkata Knight Riders. It was new-ball partner of Cummins, Mitchell Starc, who was named the ‘Player of the Match’ in the first ODI after claiming 3/33 with the ball to restrict Pakistan to 203 in 46.4 overs.

“It’s always nice to start the summer off on a positive note with the group. Powerplay wickets are always nice. Positive effort with the ball and we got the job done. I saw it swing away a bit there and we were sloppy on the field. We lost too many wickets and put pressure on us again. It’s a big summer with the Test series and 5 more white ball games before that,” Starc said at the post-match presentation.

The Australian skipper revealed that the match got much ‘tighter’ than he would have liked. “Tonight we got it done, but always much prefer sitting in the changing room. It was a wonderful match but got a bit tighter than we would have liked. I am really happy with the way the guys bowled, Starcy was terrific at the top and the others bowled really well. With this being an ODI and with the conditions, got plenty of all-rounders, might as well use them. For three-quarters we were really good, try and find some partnerships, looking to play aggressively and sometimes it may not work, but think still room to try and find a couple of partnerships,” Cummins said.