Pakistan’s senior batters Mohammad Rizwan and Babar Azam have fallen behind all ICC full-member players in ODI strike rates, ranking among the lowest this year. Since January 1, 2024, Rizwan has scored at just 75.03, while Babar’s strike rate stands at 78.88.

 

Babar’s poor run rate shows no sign of ending. It has now been 712 days since he scored his last ODI century. His most recent hundred came against Nepal in the Asia Cup 2023, when he made 151. Since then, in the past two years of ODI cricket, he has not gone beyond 78 runs in an innings.

 

In the second ODI against West Indies, he was dismissed for a duck, the fifth of his career and the first since August 2023 against Afghanistan. Though he had scored back-to-back fifties against the same side before the Asia Cup, his form has dipped sharply since his 151-run knock against Nepal.

 

In his last 28 ODI innings, Babar has scored 929 runs at an average of 37.16 and a strike rate of 79.53, well below his career averages of 54.62 and 87.78. He has made nine fifties in this period, with a highest score of 78. Before this slump, he had scored 19 centuries and 37 fifties in 102 ODI innings.

 

His struggles are not limited to ODIs. Since the Nepal century, he has played 10 Tests, averaging just 23.15 with no centuries and only three fifties. In T20 internationals, he has scored 738 runs in 24 matches at an average of 33.54.

 

During this period, Babar also lost the Pakistan captaincy, was dropped from the Test team before making a return, and has now lost his place in the national T20 side as well.