India opened their ICC World T20 campaign with a cool seven wicket win over arch-rivals Pakistan in the first match of the Super Ten phase at the Bangabandhu National Stadium yesterday.
It was not a big target to chase for the Indian batting lineup that contained Shikhar Dhawan, Virat Kohli, Suresh Raina and Mahendra Singh Dhoni and they cruised to victory with 131 in 18.3 overs with seven wickets to spare.
The 25,000+ capacity crowd, however, did not see the flair and fire of a typical T20 of the traditional sub-continental rivals; it was rather a controlled and calculative India who made a winning start.
Openers Rohit Sharma and Shikhar Dhawan put on 54 before Dhawan fell on 30. Virat Kohli and Suresh Raina ensured no further damage in the 66 runs unbeaten third wicket partnership where Kohli contributed 36 off 32 balls, including four fours and one six, and Raina adding 35 off 28 balls.
Earlier Pakistan failed to crawl out of the web cast by the Indian bowlers, the spark was never there with the last over producing 15 runs as the most productive over for Pakistan. With Kamran Akmal returning to the dressing room in the second over off a run out, Pakistan failed to attain an ideal start. Kamran, strong in playing lofted shots, scored just eight off 10 balls. The miscommunication between the Pakistani batsmen was visible again between Ahmed Shehzad and Md Hafeez, but fortunately they survived.
However, runs were not coming off the bats. Indian skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni continuously switched his bowlers. The fourth over bowled by Md Shami conceded only two runs, the 10th over by Rabindra Jadeja cost three runs, the ninth over bowled by Amit Misra was a wicket maiden and the 16th, 17th and 18th overs produced eight runs only. The first Pakistan six was hit by Shoaib Malik in the 12th over. Pakistan was never in the spree of runs and Indian bowlers apart from the 11th and 20th overs were never disturbed. Dhoni inserted Yuvraj Singh in the 11th over and it cost him 13 runs, the second highest in an over for Pakistan. The cocktail of pace and spin was perfectly mixed for a bitter taste to the Pakistani batting.
Ahmed Shehzad’s 22 off 17 balls, Umar Akmal’s 33 off 30 balls, Shoaib Malik’s 18 off 20 balls and Sohaib Maqsud’s 21 off 11 balls in the dying stage provided some respectability to the Pakistan innings. Shahid Afridi failed to fire as well. Leg spinner Amit Misra was the pick of the bowlers scalping Ahmed Shehzad and Shoaib Malik for 22 runs in his four over.