Rahmanullah Gurbaz starts party as Afghanistan claim first T20I series win over Pakistan

A tour that began with an overriding concern about crowd unrest has quickly turned into a celebration after Afghanistan sealed a first series win over Pakistan in Sharjah.

These two sides have been involved in a number of fractious encounters in the recent past, with matches between them in England, Dubai and Sharjah all drawing clashes among fans.

The T20 international series at Sharjah Cricket Stadium has been overseen by a heavy security presence, but the atmosphere has been little more than joyful among the majority Afghan following. Which is understandable, given the way their side have played.

For the second time in three days, the Afghans dominated proceedings. Rahmanullah Gurbaz played his part in three dismissals with the wicketkeeping gloves, then played the pivotal innings in the run chase as the nominal hosts closed out a seven-wicket win.

It means Afghanistan hold an unassailable 2-0 lead in the series with just Monday’s final match left to play.

In the opening game of this series on Friday night, Pakistan had failed to recover after making a horror start to their innings with the bat.

Two nights later, the beginning was even worse. By the end of the first over they had yet to register a run, but were already two wickets down, with left-arm quick Fazalhaq Farooqi accounting for Saim Ayub and Abdullah Shafique in successive balls.

As is his style, Mohammed Haris paid little heed to the turmoil, taking 15 off a second over which cost bowler Azmatullah Omarzai 18 in all. That was all Haris could manage, though, as he was caught behind off Naveen-ul-Haq in the following over.

At 63 for five after 10 overs, Pakistan might have crumbled to a similar score as in the opener, when they limped to 92 for nine from