New Zealand’s Mitchell Santner commended the Pakistan cricket team for their performance in the series, despite the visitors losing the third T20I by 45 runs on Wednesday.

The defeat in Dunedin resulted in New Zealand securing a 3-0 lead in the five-match T20I series.

Santner acknowledged Pakistan as a formidable team, emphasizing their skills and competitiveness. 

“Pakistan are a very good team and they’ve shown that when they’ve come here and wherever we play them. I think we have to talk about trying to do it for as long as he can and he did it for a long time today (on Finn Allen). It’s nice to have a (big) score on a small ground. But I guess the scoreboard pressure, (allows us to be) aggressive and then you know, try and get that run rate quite high,” Santner said.

Finn Allen’s exceptional innings of 137 runs in 62 balls propelled New Zealand to set a challenging target of 225 runs for Pakistan in the third T20I. In response, Babar Azam continued his impressive form, scoring 58 off 37 balls, marking his third consecutive fifty in the series. 

However, despite a promising start with Pakistan reaching 95 for two in the 11th over, a flurry of wickets disrupted their chase, resulting in a loss of four wickets for just 39 runs.

Mitchell Santner himself contributed with an economical bowling spell, taking one wicket for 26 runs in four overs.