Babar Azam shatters Gayle’s record, becomes fastest to score 7,000 T20 runs

Pakistani skipper Babar Azam on Sunday became the fastest to reach the 7,000 runs mark in T20 cricket, surpassing flamboyant West Indian cricketer Chris Gayle.

Babar reached the landmark during Central Punjab’s National T20 Cup clash against Southern Punjab, playing his 187th inning. He needed only four runs to reach the milestone when he walked in to bat on Sunday. 

Azam broke West Indian batsman Chris Gayle’s record, who had crossed the 7,000 T20 runs mark in his 192nd inning. 

Babar was three innings short of Chris Gayle’s record when he reached 6,000 runs earlier this year. Since then, he has taken only 22 innings to add another 1,000 runs to his total T20 runs tally.

Of his 7,000 T20 runs, 2,204 have been scored in T20Is. In April this year, Babar Azam had surpassed Virat Kohli’s record to become the fastest to make 2,000 runs in T20 internationals, beating the Indian skipper by a margin of four innings.

Azam had scored 2,000 T20I runs from just 52 innings, whereas Kohli, who previously held the record for being the fastest to make 2,000 T20I runs, managed to do the same in just 56 innings. 

He is the 11th cricketer to score 2,000 T20I runs.

Last week, Babar smashed the sixth T20 century of his career to register a record for the most number of T20 hundreds by a Pakistani batsman. With 64 scores of 50 or more from 186 innings, Babar Azam has the best ratio of 50s/innings in T20 cricket among all the top batsmen in the world.