Quick wickets stall Pakistan

An edgy start by Pakistan turned into a solid one, but when Younis Khan and Shoaib Malik fell in fairly quick succession, Australia held the upper hand by the half-way mark. Salman Butt held the key for Pakistan, after being involved in the run-out of the 17-year-old debutant Ahmed Shehzad.

Shehzad had hit towards square leg and set off straight away. Butt responded to the call but pulled out half-way, and both the batsmen ended up at the non-striker's end.

Nathan Bracken and ODI debutant Doug Bollinger, both left-arm seamers, went on to trouble Butt and Younis for a considerable time. Both batsmen struggled with the angle and movement both ways, and their starts were literally edgy. Both edged wide of the slips at catchable heights on one occasion each, and Butt got away with several other edges in the initial overs. By the end of the ninth over, Pakistan had crawled to 28 for 1, having faced a maiden each from both the bowlers.

With James Hopes came the change of the angle, and Younis helped himself to three boundaries in Hopes' first two overs. In the next seven overs, Pakistan doubled their score, mainly via Younis who scored 20 off 14 during that period. The sight of Ben Laughlin lit his eyes up, a short loosener first up widened them further, and an edge resulted as he went to cut the leather off the ball. An edge resulted, and Australia were right back.

Malik couldn't make much of a drop by Shane Watson off Nathan Hauritz, and got out in a freak manner off the same bowler. A cross-batted swipe took the inside edge, hit the back of his boot and lobbed up for Brad Haddin to take a diving catch and push Pakistan back further.

Butt, meanwhile, had started hitting some lovely cover-driven boundaries to get a move on from a slow start. From 16 off 33 he had moved to 42 off 85 balls, and stood between Australia and an easy target.