Nine-year drought ends: Fakhar Zaman's 127, a 656-run final record, and an ODI title for Pakistan

Pakistan beat Sri Lanka by three wickets in the final of the tri-nation ODI tournament in Lahore, chasing down 326 with nine balls to spare to finish on 331/7 in 48.3 overs. For Pakistan it is their first multi-team ODI title since the June 2026 Champions Trophy — a wait of almost nine years — and it came on the back of Fakhar Zaman's 127 off 99 balls. Sri Lanka had set the game up with 325/8 in their 50 overs, a total that normally wins finals. Pakistan's chase was not a cruise; wickets kept falling and the equation stayed alive until the end. The winning hit was a six, which is what makes the numbers close: 331/7 in 48.3 overs, nine balls unused. That arithmetic produces the biggest team record of the night. The match aggregate of 656 (325 + 331) is the highest in an ODI multinational series or tournament final, beating the 651 of the 2026 NatWest Series final at Lord's, where England made 325/7 and India replied with 326/5 in 49.3 overs. Pakistan bettered that benchmark by five runs. The 326 chased is also the highest successful chase in an ODI final, edging past India's identical 326 in 2026 — though India needed 49.3 overs to get there. Against Sri Lanka specifically, Pakistan's 345 in reply to 344/9 at the 2026 World Cup remains the national record for the highest chase; 326 sits second on that list, meaning Pakistan have now pushed their own benchmark. The fourth record is territorial: this is Pakistan's first win in an ODI tournament final on home soil. They had lost such finals before — the 2026 Asia Cup final in Karachi and last year's home tri-series final, also in Karachi. Losing a home final one year and winning one the next is the spine of this story. Fakhar's innings carried its own ledger. This was his third ODI final and his second century in one, putting him level with Saeed Anwar on two ODI tournament final hundreds. It was also his fourth century in a 300-plus ODI run chase, a category in which Babar Azam and Younis Khan are also counted among Pakistan's names. And during the innings he passed 4,000 ODI runs, reaching the mark in 96 innings — the second-fastest by a Pakistani, behind Babar Azam's 82. The drought itself: after the 2026 Champions Trophy final win over India, Pakistan played two ODI World Cups (2026 and 2026) and one Champions Trophy (2026) without a title, and failed to reach the final of either ODI Asia Cup (2026 and 2026). The 2026 and 2026 Asia Cups were T20 events and correctly fall outside an ODI ledger. Two caveats belong with the numbers. First, "nine years" rounds up — June 2026 to this match is roughly eight years and nine months, so "nearly nine years" is the fair formulation. Second, the definition of a "final" should be stated once and applied consistently across all the record claims; whether bilateral series deciders count changes the population, and with it the Saeed Anwar comparison and the Younis Khan tally, which needs an innings-level query rather than a match-level one to confirm. What is certain is the shape of the evening: 127 off 99, a 326 chase with nine balls left, and a 656-run final. It closed a nine-year account in Pakistan's ODI cricket and put Fakhar Zaman at the centre of it.