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| Match winning 92 by Kamran Akmal |
As anticipated an all out war broke out at the warm-up T20 cricket match
between India and Pakistan in Colombo today in the run-up to the ICC World Cup
T20 tournament starting tomorrow. In line with the epic cricket wars between
the archrivals even this insignificant practice match whipped up passion and
tension in cricket lovers. Amidst ups and downs finally Pakistan emerged triumphant beating India by five
wickets with nearly an over to spare.
India
elected to bat winning the toss and lost Gambhir early. Sehwag too could not
get going after a good start and it was the ICC ODI Cricketer of the Year Virat
Kohli again who took command. With Rohit Sharma Virat crafted a partnership of
127 runs to take the total score to 185/3 and set a challenging target of 186
runs for Pakistan.
Virat remained unbeaten on 75 off only 47 balls with 7 fours and 2 sixes. As in
the practice match against Sri Lanka
that India
won comfortably Rohit came good here too scoring 56 runs off 40 balls with 6
fours and 2 sixes. Except for Saeed Ajmal Pakistan bowlers failed to rein in
the Indian batsmen.
Pakistan
started well, but the same old story of unpredictability almost repeated itself
with the team reduced to 91/5 in the 12th over thanks only to
terrific bowling by R Ashwin who finished with an incredible figure of 4 wickets
for 23 runs in 4 overs. At that stage Pakistan
needed 86 runs in 51 balls and India
had the best chance to force a win. But keeper Kamran Akmal had better ideas as
he tore the Indian bowlers apart and raced to an unbeaten 92 superlative runs
off only 50 balls with 5 fours and 6 huge sixes. With an equally belligerent
former Pak captain Shoaib Malik (quick fire 37 off 18) Akmal led his team to
victory not losing any more wicket with 5 balls to spare. The Scorecard:
As the ICC World Cup T20 starts tomorrow India
has cause to worry about failing to contain Pakistan with five frontline
bowlers including the comeback man Harbhajan Singh. Irfan Pathan who seemed to
have continued his terrific form in the last practice match against Sri Lanka
failed miserably today. Another worry being India’s over-dependence on Virat
Kohli his super batting form notwithstanding. For the pluses Rohit Sharma seems
to have found form at last and that the sub-continental conditions would favor India.
India, Sri Lanka and South Africa are the hot favorites
for the title, but in this shortest format of the game any weak team is
immensely capable of surprising the biggies. Besides, Pakistan as ever with its
glorious unpredictability, West Indies with Chris Gayle back, defending
champions England though without Kevin Pietersen, sharp as ever cricket by New
Zealand and yet to be beaten by India in T20 history, and even supposed minnows
Bangladesh—all have their chances to win the title. Australia
who could never make it good in T20 and lost the practice match to England is the
darkest of all horses!
Tomorrow hosts Sri Lanka
play Zimbabwe
in the inaugural match. India
play their first match against largely unknown Afghanistan on the 19th.
A combination of league and round robin the tournament is little complicated. Two
top teams from four groups go to the Super 8s. The Super 8s stage consists of
the top two teams from each group of the group stage. Even at this level the
teams are split into two groups, Groups E and F. Group E will consist of the
top seed from Groups A and C, and the second seed of groups B and D. Group F
will consist of the top seed from Groups B and D, and the second seed of groups
A and C. Thanks to the rules number of matches gets reduced and the chances of archrivals like India and Pakistan meeting each other at this stage is
uncertain.
With nations and national pride involved the shortest format of cricket,
normally used for commercial purposes, the ICC World Cup T20 2012 in Sri Lanka is
eagerly awaited and is expected to be keenly fought.
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