Babar Azam achieves another milestone in first South Africa Test

Former Pakistan captain Babar Azam reached a major career milestone during the opening Test against South Africa at the Gaddafi Stadium on Sunday, becoming the first Pakistani batter to score over 3,000 runs in the ICC World Test Championship (WTC).

The right-handed batter achieved the feat in his 37th Test match, joining an elite group of just eight players to have surpassed the 3,000-run mark in the championship’s history. Babar’s WTC record includes eight centuries and 18 half-centuries to date.

The list of players with over 3,000 WTC runs features England’s Zak Crawley (3,041), Ben Stokes (3,616) and Joe Root (6,080) — who leads the overall tally — along with Australian stars Steve Smith (4,278), Marnus Labuschagne (4,225), Travis Head (3,300) and Usman Khawaja (3,288).

At the time of filing this report, Pakistan stood at 308 for five in 86 overs, with wicketkeeper-batter Mohammad Rizwan unbeaten on 60 and Salman Ali Agha on 49. The pair’s unbeaten 109-run partnership helped Pakistan recover after a middle-order collapse saw the hosts slip from 163-1 to 199-5.

Earlier, a 161-run stand between captain Shan Masood and Imam-ul-Haq steadied Pakistan’s innings after an early setback.

The first Test marks the beginning of a two-match series between Pakistan and South Africa.