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Another year has passed, and Pakistan cricket in 2025 has found ways to falter in longer formats. There were some promising performances in T20Is. But existing flaws are yet to be rectified by the team management, coaches and the players themselves.
The year started with a highly anticipated home tournament, the Champions Trophy. An event that was hosted by the nation for the first time since the 1996 ODI World Cup. An event where the national team last won an ICC event and were looking to defend it, despite playing it on two different venues due to India’s stubbornness.
Instead, it met with a poor end and were eliminated in the first round. Mohammad Rizwan, who started his ODI captaincy with three overseas series wins in Australia, South Africa and Zimbabwe, found himself losing his white-ball captaincy. And to add more salt to the wound, he and his partner Babar Azam lost their places in the T20I squad.
2025 was a mess for Pakistan. They had some fruitful results. But constant chopping and changing have pushed Pakistan further back in their play.
Also Read: From Hosts to Humiliation – Pakistan’s Champions Trophy 2025 Exit Ends in Disaster
Pakistan Cricket in 2025: A Review
The national team played five Test matches, 17 One Day matches and a staggering 34 T20I matches. They won two Tests, seven ODIs and 21 T20I games, having a total wins of 30 out of 56 games that were played this year.
FormatPlayedWinsLossesT/NRDrawW/L %Test523000.67ODI17710000.7T20I342113001.61Total563026001.15
Test and ODIs: Falling into new lows in longer formats
A combined of just 22 matches have been played between the two formats as compared to 34 T20Is. This issue was raised before about PCB’s motives and where they are heading with the cricket team, and hoped that this would lower the shortest format’s run. Apparently, that hasn’t been the case. At least, not yet.
For Test cricket, Pakistan have played three against South Africa and two against the West Indies, all being part of the World Test Championship.
The first three games (one against South Africa, which was an ongoing series, and two against West Indies in January) were the last matches for Pakistan of their previous cycle. A loss in their last Test match meant that they fell to the bottom of the cycle, making it their worst run in the WTC cycle. Pakistan began their next cycle with a series drawn against South Africa at home.
As per One Day cricket, there were a lot of expectations from this format. But it met with a poor run before slowly crumbling back to victories.
They started with a tri-series where they played the final but lost. In fact, Pakistan have played New Zealand six times (three each at home and away). And they lost all of them to the black caps, including the Champions Trophy opener and the ODI series.
A disappointing tournament and a whitewash in New Zealand were also met with a series loss to the West Indies. It was the first time in 30 years that the West Indies won an ODI series against Pakistan. Following this, Rizwan lost his leadership in ODIs.
Shaheen Afridi was shortly appointed as the new ODI captain and immediately won home series over South Africa and Sri Lanka.
Pakistan Cricket in 2025: T20S prioritised and dominated, but still struggling to keep up
The headlines of the T20I cricket were the dropping of Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan, Pakistan’s top two highest run-scorers in the format. And it seemed to mark a new beginning in the shortest format.
A staggering 34 T20Is have been played by Pakistan this year alone. They won 21 games. In terms of series, they won five out of seven (two tri-series included). They played the final of the Asia Cup.
Overall, they had enjoyed a great T20 International cricket in 2025. Of course, it did not start well. They lost two of their first three series; a 4-1 loss in New Zealand was followed by a 3-0 whitewash to Bangladesh. But shortly after that series win, the Green Team travelled to Bangladesh and met with a series loss, marking the first series loss for Pakistan against them.
Also Read: End of RizBar – World’s most successful yet dysfunctional partnership in T20Is
Afterwards, Pakistan played a tri-series featuring the UAE and Afghanistan as preparation for the 2025 Men’s Asia Cup. It was a successful series. They did lose to Afghanistan in the league stage, but outplayed them in the final.
The Asia Cup was soon followed. They lost three games out of seven and played the final. All three games that they lost were against India, who registered yet another title in the Asian Championship. This also met with the ugly “No Handshake” saga, something that will not die soon.
They played South Africa in the bilateral series and another tri-series involving Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe. Pakistan won both to end their T20I cricket on a high.
Pakistan Cricket in 2025: Women’s and Youth Cricket Results
Not much cricket was played by the Women’s team. They played only 15 international cricket matches this year, three of them just T20Is.
They started off winning the Women’s World Cup Qualifiers without a loss and participated in the 2025 Women’s ODI World Cup. However, they could not register a single win and ended at the bottom once again. They ended the year with a 2-1 series loss to South Africa. In addition to the three T20Is they played against Ireland, they lost 2-1 as well.
As for the U19 team, they had a successful tournament. They won the U19 Asia Cup for the first time in 13 years after Sameer Minhas and Ali Raza outplayed India in the final.
The Emerging team also had a fruitful result; Pakistan Shaheens won the Emerging Asia Cup (now renamed as Rising Stars Asia Cup) after winning a thriller against Bangladesh in the final.
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