Highest Opening Partnership in T20 World Cup

England’s Jos Buttler and Alex Hales hold the record for registering the highest opening partnership in T20 World Cup history. The swashbuckling duo achieved the feat at the semi-final stage against Team India in 2022.

Having been set a target of 169, Buttler and Hales made a mockery of the Indian bowling attack, as they wiped out the deficit with ridiculous ease. While Buttler smashed a 49-ball 80*, Hales obliterated the Indian attack to the tune of 86 (off 47 deliveries) with the help of four fours and seven maximums.

Interestingly, the top two highest Opening partnerships have come against the Men in Blue. In 2021, Pakistan’s Babar Azam and Mohammad Rizwan scripted an unbeaten 152-run-stand to help their team register first-ever win over the arch-rivals in World Cup cricket.

The third spot is reserved for the West Indian opening pair of Chris Gayle and Devon Smith, who lit up the opening match of the inaugural T20 World Cup by accumulating 145 runs for the first wicket against South Africa at the Wanderers in Johannesburg in 2007.

The Pakistani duo of Kamran Akmal and Salman Butt (142 vs. Bangladesh in 2010) is at the fourth spot.

As far as Indians are concerned, the legendary duo of Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir held the record for the highest opening stand by an Indian pair in the tournament’s history between September 2007-October 2021. Gambhir and Sehwag accumulated 136 runs against England in Durban in the inaugural event.

Their record was broken by Rohit Sharma and KL Rahul, who added 140 runs for the first wicket in a Super-12 match against Afghanistan in 2021.

The only associate team to feature in the top ten list is Oman, thanks to Aqib Ilyas and Jatinder Singh’s 131-run-stand against Papua New Guinea in 2021.