Pakistan won the toss and elected to bowl in the fourth Twenty20 against New Zealand in Mount Maunganui on Sunday as they bid to square the five-match series.
Captain Salman Agha’s decision was no surprise, given that the chasing team has comfortably won each of the first three games of the series.
New Zealand made two changes from the team that lost the third match convincingly in Auckland on Friday by nine wickets, leaving Pakistan trailing 2-1.
Both are to their seam attack, with Zak Foulkes and Will O’Rourke replacing Kyle Jamieson and Ben Sears.
Pakistan are unchanged from the team that won at Eden Park, highlighted by opener Hasan Nawaz’s maiden century of 105 not out off 45 balls.
The average first-innings score at Mount Maunganui’s Bay Oval since 2020 is 176 which suggests that Sunday’s game may not produce the fireworks that featured the outing in Auckland. Though it may remain slightly cloudy, no weather interruption is expected in the fourth game.
New Zealand: Tim Seifert, Finn Allen, Mark Chapman, Daryl Mitchell, James Neesham, Mitchell Hay, Michael Bracewell (capt), Ish Sodhi, Zak Foulkes, Jacob Duffy, Will O’Rourke
Pakistan: Mohammad Haris, Hasan Nawaz, Salman Agha (capt), Irfan Khan, Shadab Khan, Abdul Samad, Khushdil Shah, Abbas Afridi, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Haris Rauf, Abrar Ahmed
Umpires: Chris Brown (NZL), Wayne Knights (NZL)
TV umpire: Kim Cotton (NZL)
Match referee: Jeff Crowe (NZL)
