'Babar Azam missed his century by 95 runs,' joke cricket fans as Pak top order collapses in WC match against Netherlands

The unforeseen collapse of the much-vaunted Pakistan's top order against Netherlands in their opening ICC World Cup 2023 match in Hyderabad has flooded social media with hilarious memes.

Netherlands won the toss and elected to bowl against Pakistan in their opening ODI World Cup match at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad on Friday.

Pakistan's top order -- Fakhar Zaman, Imam-ul-Haq and Babar Azam -- collapsed in the first 10 overs, with the skipper Azam falling for a mere five runs of 18 balls. Soon after his soft dismissal, netizens took to X (formerly Twitter) to share their reactions.

 An X user quipped, "I would die but will never ever consider Babar Azam superior over Devon Conway."

Another X user called Azam the "most overrated player ever". "He missed his well deserved hundred by just 95 runs... This proved he just needs teams like Zimbabwe and Nepal...n they compare him with king kohli," said another X user.

Meanwhile, netizens also praised the performance of Netherlands in the first ODI World Cup game.

"You can’t take netherlands lightly. They qualified without some of their top players," an X user wrote. Another said, "It sounds like the Netherlands is putting up a strong performance against Pakistan in the cricket match. Early wickets in the powerplay can make a significant impact on the outcome of the game. Cricket can be full of surprises, and it'll be interesting to see how the match unfolds from here."

Another added, "Surprisingly superb performance by Netherlands".

However, Pakistan batsmen Mohammad Rizwan and Saud Shakeel rebuilt the innings with an unbeaten partnership of 101 runs at the time of publishing this article.

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Rizwan was playing at 47 off 55 balls while Saud Shakeel was unbeaten at 57 off 40 deliveries.

Teams:

Pakistan: Babar Azam (c), Imam-ul-Haq, Fakhar Zaman, Mohammad Rizwan (wk), Saud Shakeel, Iftikhar Ahmed, Shadab Khan, Mohammad Nawaz, Hasan Ali, Shaheen Afridi, Haris Rauf.

Netherlands: Vikramjit Singh, Max O'Dowd, Colin Ackermann, Scott Edwards (wk/c), Bas de Leede, Teja Nidamanuru, Saqib Zulfiqar, Logan van Beek, Roelof van der Merwe, Aryan Dutt, Paul van Meekeren.  

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