Ricky Ponting praised Cameron White's maturity as the Victorian broke his home-soil shackles to blast Australia to a five-wicket win at the Gabba on Friday night.
White produced his finest one-day knock in Australia, bashing 105 off 88 balls with eight fours and four sixes, to lead Ponting's team past Pakistan's total of 274 with nine balls to spare.
After 22 ODIs at home, it was the first time the big Victorian had scored a half-century let alone a hundred, and his rampaging innings deserved to be witnessed by a much bigger crowd than the 19,758 on hand.
Australia were a shaky 3-84 after 18 overs when White replaced an out-of-touch Ricky Ponting (27) at the crease.
Ponting said the burly 26-year-old timed his innings perfectly, putting a down payment on victory with three consecutive sixes off Shahid Afridi in the 41st over.
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"It was a very good win tonight, it was made to look reasonably comfortable because of the couple of partnerships through the middle and how well Cameron played," the skipper said.
"He does see the game really well and even the way the partnership between him and Michael Clarke developed and holding back the powerplay the way they did and knowing the right time to put the foot down really stood out tonight."
Ponting was also well pleased how his team slipped straight into the groove of the 50-over game following the three-Test whitewash of the Pakistanis.
"Coming out of Test cricket and straight into one-day cricket always takes a little bit of adjustment but I think overall tonight our bowling skills were pretty good right the way through and the majority of the batters did very well," he said.
Butt leads for Pakistan
Pakistan opener Salman Butt (71 off 82) led the way for the tourists on a fast and bouncy Gabba wicket but he lamented some average bowling.
"It was a good fighting score and so if we bowled well we could have won this game," he said.
"I think the batters did well, 275 is a good score anywhere, but I think we did a pretty good job on this pitch."
Crowd dissapoints
The worrying cloud over one-day cricket's future darkened with the Gabba half-empty for the opening match of the five-game series.
The attendance stands as by far the worst in Brisbane for a 50-over match featuring Australia; 35,000-plus crowds have been the norm since the Gabba was redeveloped a decade ago.
The Gabba annually packed in more fans in the 1980s and '90s when the ground was lined by a dog track and could only hold a bare 21,000.
There are fears the crowd for the second match in Sydney on Sunday will be equally as bad with only 17,500 tickets sold.
Australia will go there 1-0 up thanks mainly to White's second one-day century.
White, whose previous highest score in 22 matches in Australia was 45, combined with vice-captain Clarke (58 off 76) for a professional 102-run stand which tipped the balance in Australia's favour.
