Pakistan has finally found its Matthew Hayden, and his name is Maaz Sadaqat. For nearly two decades, Pakistan has been searching for a left-handed opener who does not just see off the new ball but dominates it, who walks out with a physical presence that puts bowlers on the defensive from the very first over. In Australia that role was defined by Hayden, tall, powerful, unapologetically aggressive, a batter who turned the opening partnership into an act of intimidation. In Pakistan, that role now belongs to a 21-year-old from Peshawar.
Maaz Sadaqat was born on May 15, 2005, and his journey did not begin in elite academies but in street cricket and at Ashnaghar Cricket Club in Peshawar, where he was taken by his elder brother Haroon after completing his matriculation. A left-handed batter who also bowls slow left-arm orthodox, he is built like Hayden, not for elegance but for power, and he bats with the same philosophy. He played the Under-19 Asia Cup in 2021, the Under-19 World Cup in 2022, and by 2025 he was named Player of the Tournament as Pakistan Shaheens won the ACC Rising Stars Asia Cup in Doha, also winning the Hong Kong Super Sixes. His franchise breakthrough came with Peshawar Zalmi, where on his PSL debut in 2025 he scored 55 from 33 balls and added 102 with Babar Azam to win Player of the Match.
What makes the comparison with Hayden inevitable is not just that both are left-handers, but how they score. Hayden never looked to nudge and rotate; he looked to impose. Sadaqat does the same. In his last seven T20 innings he has scored 451 runs at an average of 64.42 with a strike rate of 196.94. The numbers are not inflated by one knock. They include a historic Caribbean Premier League campaign where he became the youngest centurion in CPL history, scored two centuries including 114 off 58 balls in the final, the first hundred ever in a CPL final, and finished with 363 runs in just seven matches, behind only Quinton de Kock and Shimron Hetmyer who played more games.
He has now transferred that form to international cricket. On October 11 at Rawalpindi, against Sri Lanka, he blasted 96 off 51 balls with five fours and seven sixes, falling just four runs short of a third century in a month on the final ball of the innings. Pakistan posted 195 for 5 and won by 82 runs, its biggest win over Sri Lanka by runs. A week earlier, in the Asian Games semi-final against India, he had scored 23 off 18 with three boundaries at a strike rate of 127 when most of his teammates struggled.
Like Hayden, Sadaqat is more than an opener. Hayden’s value lay in his fielding and his mindset. Sadaqat offers genuine all-round balance. In only his second ODI in March 2026 against Bangladesh, he smashed 75 off 46 balls and took three wickets for 23 to win Player of the Match by 128 runs under DLS. In domestic cricket he averages over 35 across first-class, List A and T20 cricket, and in the President’s Cup 2024-25 he scored 374 runs in seven games at a strike rate of 144.40, including a 57-ball hundred.
Pakistan’s need for such a player has been tactical. Since 2025, eleven players have opened for Pakistan in T20Is, but only three average over 35, and the debate over intent has dominated every selection meeting. Sadaqat does not debate intent. He demonstrates it. He walks down the pitch to fast bowlers, he hits spinners over mid-wicket in the powerplay, he treats dot balls as an insult. It is exactly how Hayden changed Australia’s approach in 2000 and 2001.
At 21, Maaz Sadaqat is not a prospect anymore. He is a statement. Pakistan has been looking for its Hayden for years. It may have finally found him, not imported, but produced in Peshawar.