Top Ten Openers in Twenty20 from Pakistan Cricket Team

Twenty20 cricket is about an aggressive game. The list given below is of top ten openers of Pakistan, it shows how aggressive openers can be successful in Twenty20 cricket. Opening batsmen like Kamran Akmal and the hard hitter Imran Nazir have shown their capabilities in this format of the game, but Salman Butt with a classic touch has also proven the fact that you can score huge amounts of runs by playing proper cricketing shots and also by picking singles and doubles. Although Salman Butt is a classy cricketer, he is at no 2 in the list of the top ten Pakistani openers, overtaken by Kamran Akmal. Scoring boundaries in Twenty20 cricket does not mean slogging everything that comes on the bat, and Salman Butt is a prime example of that.

Serial No	Player	Runs
1	Kamran Akmal	704
2	Salman Butt	595
3	Imran Nazir	324
4	Muhammad Hafeez	262
5	Shahzaib Hasan	116
6	Shoaib Khan	65
7	Imran Farhat	41
8	Muhammad Amir	39
9	Khalid Latif	30
10	Ahmed Shehzad	8

Although Salman Butt was great with bat, he has tarnished his image and spoiled his career by getting involved in betting. Usually when Pakistan Cricket Team is playing a T20 match, the spectators look forward to Shahid Afridi’s innings. He is tailor made for T20 style of cricket though he rarely has scored big in T20 till now. Also, in recent years he has not played as opener.

With the growth of T20 cricket, the techniques related to the game have also improved. T20 has proved to be a game changer for the sport. Pakistan has introduced many good openers in the team since T20 has become popular. These openers are usually those players who play at a very high strike rate. Ahmed Shahzad, Nasir Jamshed and Muhammad Hafeez still open frequently for Pakistan. Although many have opened the innings for Pakistan, Imran Nazir’s opening innings are still considered a sensation.