Pakistan rode Babar Azam's century and brilliant bowling by their seamers to notch a convincing 83-run victory against Sri Lanka in the first one-day international.
Azam, who could total only 39 runs in Pakistan's 2-0 loss in the Test series, returned to form with 103 off 131 balls and Shoaib Malik swelled Pakistan's total to 6-292 by smashing 81 off 61 deliveries after being sent into bat.
Seamers Hasan Ali (3-36) and Rumman Raees (3-49) snared six wickets between them before Lahiru Thirimanne (53) and Akila Dananjaya (50 not out) delayed the inevitable and carried Sri Lanka to 8-209.
"When you lose one series, the first match of the next series becomes very important, credit to the boys," Pakistan captain Sarfraz Ahmed said.
"We've got a lot of bowling options. This bodes well for us. The way we've done today, we'll look to carry this template forward."
Earlier, Fakhar Zaman (43) and Mohammad Hafeez (32) couldn't convert good starts before Azam and Malik dominated Sri Lanka bowling in a 139-run stand with a bit of luck.
Azam was dropped on 42 and could have been out caught behind off legspinner Akila Dananjaya soon after reaching 50 but Sri Lanka earlier squandered their only video review.
Malik batted with lot of freedom, hitting two sixes and five fours and kept pushing up the scoring rate through brilliant running between the wickets with Azam as Sri Lanka struggled to contain the runs late in the innings.
Sri Lanka struggled to pace their chase against both Raees and Hasan.
Raees dismissed Niroshan Dickwella (19) and Dinesh Chandimal (4) before captain captain Upul Tharanga was clean bowled by Hafeez while attempting a needless pull shot against the offspinner.
Sri Lanka stuttered to 5-67 when Ali removed Kusal Mendis (2) and Milinda Siriwardana off successive deliveries as Raees returned and had Thirimanne trapped lbw.
Dananjaya and Jeffrey Vandersay (25) put on 68 runs for the eighth wicket but couldn't prevent Sri Lanka slumping to an eighth-straight ODI defeat.
"Pakistan batted really well. At one stage, we thought we could restrict them to below 270," Tharanga said. "We haven't batted to potential in the last few series ... it's time we deliver."
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