ICC World Cup: West Indies beat Pakistan by 7 wickets

Nottingham

West Indies eased to a seven-wicket victory over Pakistan in their World Cup opener at Trent Bridge on Friday after an Oshane Thomas-led pace attack swept them away for 105.

Opener Chris Gayle, set to retire at the end of the tournament, led the Windies reply with a blistering 50 off 34 balls as the two-time champions chased down the total, reaching 108-3 with 36.2 overs to spare.

Having elected to field, West Indies made full use of overcast conditions as Thomas took four wickets for 27 runs, while captain Jason Holder (3-42) and the returning Andre Russell (2-4) completed the demolition job.

Pakistan were dismissed in 21.4 overs for their lowest World Cup total since a paltry 74 against England at Adelaide in 1992, the year Imran Khan’s team went on to lift their only 50-overs crown.

Fast bowler Mohammad Amir, making his World Cup debut, took the 3 wickets that fell for 26 runs in 6 overs.

Amir missed the 2011 and 2015 tournaments due to a spot-fixing ban and was also sidelined in the last four matches of the recent one-day international series against England due to chicken pox.

Pakistan left out experienced batsman Shoaib Malik, playing his last World Cup, and also hard-hitting batsman Asif Ali to go with two frontline spinners and three fast bowlers.

Seam bowler Kemar Roach was left out of the West Indies line-up.

“I don’t think the conditions will change much,” said West Indies captain Jason Holder.

“Hopefully we can use the overhead conditions to get some early wickets. We’ve had a good camp and got a lot out of our warm-up games.”

Pakistan skipper Sarfaraz Ahmed said: “We wanted to bowl first because of the overcast conditions and a bit of moisture, but it will be a good batting pitch.”

Teams:

Pakistan: Sarfaraz Ahmed (captain), Fakhar Zaman, Imam-ul-Haq, Babar Azam, Haris Sohail, Mohammad Hafeez, Imad Wasim, Shadab Khan, Hasan Ali, Wahab Riaz, Mohammad Amir

West Indies: Jason Holder (captain), Chris Gayle, Shai Hope, Darren Bravo, Nicholas Pooran, Shimron Hetmyer, Andre Russell, Carlos Brathwaite, Ashley Nurse, Sheldon Cottrell, Oshane Thomas

Umpires: Chris Gaffaney (NZL) and Marais Erasmus (RSA) TV umpire: Sundaram Ravi (IND) Match referee: Jeff Crowe (NZL).