Pakistan fans' Babar obsession crashes Somerset website

Babar Azam is widely regarded as Pakistan's best batsman, with his impeccable technique and timing making him one of the most eye-catching players in world cricket. He had a more than decent World Cup campaign, hitting his maiden hundred in the tournament against New Zealand, and amassing 474 runs in nine innings.

He has carried that form over to England's T20 league, the Vitality blast, where he has scored 267 runs for Somerset so far. But his popularity reached its peak recently, when Pakistan fans, desperate to catch Babar Azam bat for Somerset actually managed to shut down the website, according to an ESPNCricinfo report.

So many of them logged in during his debut game against Glamorgan that the website could not accommodate them all, and it crashed, forcing the county's digital marketing executive had to upgrade their server capacity. The game was not streamed live, and so all the fans went to the Somerset website to track his progress.

After the incident, the county decided to live stream their matches on YouTube and almost 1.5 million users watched Somerset's batting against Sussex.

Babar has been touted to become the next Pakistani captain, as Sarfaraz Ahmed has come under fire recently, and it was also reported that coach Mickey Arthur was supportive of the move. Babar is currently the no.1 ranked T20 batsman, ahead of Colin Munro and Glenn Maxwell.