KARACHI: Nauman Ali is considered as a wily slow left-armer capable of providing useful runs down the order.

On Saturday, the Test bowler finally celebrated scoring a maiden first-class century. The Northern skipper bettered his previous best score of 97 by hitting up a rapid undefeated 103 (112 balls, 12 fours, two sixes) in the drawn Quaid-e-Azam Trophy fixture against Khyber Pakhtunkhwa at the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore.

Responding to the rivals’ first-innings score of 337, Northern declared at 511-8 after having resumed the fourth and final day at 472-6. Umar Amin, however, was extremely unfortunate when the ex-Pakistan batter was run out with adding to his Friday’s tally of 94 to end a fabulous seven-wicket partnership of 159 with fellow left-hander Nauman.

Sahibzada Farhan then made good use of the remaining time to score his second 70-plus score of the match.

The other two first-round fixtures in Faisalabad and Multan, predictably enough, yielded stalemates as well with Pakistan discard Ahmed Shehzad falling nine short of what would have been a 16th first-class ton for the 29-year-old Central Punjab opener.

Scores and results on Saturday (final day of four):

First round:

At Gaddafi Stadium, Lahore: Match drawn.

KHYBER PAKHTUNKHWA 337 in 105.1 overs (Sahibzada Farhan 71, Iftikhar Ahmed 51, Israrullah 50, Khalid Usman 39, Sajid Khan 32, Rehan Afridi 26; Mohammad Musa Khan 5-78, Munir Riaz 2-45) and 158-1 in 40 overs (Sahibzada Farhan 79 not out, Israrullah 59); NORTHERN 511-8 declared in 144.2 overs (Faizan Riaz 115, Mubasir Khan 112, Nauman Ali 103 not out, Umar Amin 94, Nasir Nawaz 25; Sajid Khan 3-88, Imran Khan 3-88).

At Iqbal Stadium, Faisalabad: Match drawn

BALOCHISTAN 402 in 133 overs (Imran Butt 104, Inam-ul-Haq 97, Bismillah khan 74, Abdul Wahid Bangalzai 63, Ayaz Tasawwar 30; Mir Hamza 2-32, Mohammad Hasnain 2-47, Mohammad Asghar 2-111, Ashiq Ali 2-129) and 127-3 in 59 overs (Imran Butt 59, Kashif Bhatti 25 not out; Mohammad Asghar 2-48); SINDH 324 in 137.4 overs (Khurram Manzoor 153, Saad Khan 70, Mohammad Hasan 43; Raza-ul-Hasan 5-132, Faiz Gohar 2-38, Amad Butt 2-44).

At Multan Cricket Stadium, Multan: Match drawn.

CENTRAL PUNJAB 384 in 115.3 overs (Abid Ali 158, Ahmed Shehzad 63, Hussain Talat 52, Junaid Ali 27, Azhar Ali 25; Ali Usman 4-99, Aamir Yamin 2-60, Mohammad Ilyas 2-86) and 212-4 declared in 40.4 overs (Ahmed Shehzad 91, Azhar Ai 47, Abid Ali 41); SOUTHERN PUNJAB 252 in 89.5 overs (Tayyab Tahir 79, Zia-ul-Haq 35, Azam Khan 29, Imran Rafiq 23, Naved Yasin 21; Zafar Gohar 4-93, Ehsan Adil 2-61) and 218-4 in 66 overs (Zain Abbas 85, Umar Siddique 71, Imran Rafiq 35 not out; Zafar Gohar 3-96).

Published in Dawn, October 24th, 2021