A brilliant half-century from Hardik Pandya and a three-wicket haul from Kuldeep Yadav headlined India’s 50-run win over Bangladesh in their Super 8 fixture in Antigua. Hardik Pandya once again proved why in World Cups he becomes the all rounder India needs even after poor IPL. The result means that India have a foot in the semifinal at this T20 World Cup and they will be through if Afghanistan fail to beat Australia later in the night.
Apart from Hardik Pandya, When Bangladesh opted to bowl first, captain Nazmul Hossain Shanto hoped to keep India to a safe score of “150 to 160”. In response, India muscled away 13 sixes, the most they have hit in a T20 World Cup match. It was five more than Bangladesh hit. More importantly, 10 of India’s 13 sixes came outside the PowerPlay and that made all the difference in the match that Bangladesh lost.
Pitch and Toss
“There’s a strong breeze blowing across. Should be pretty good for batting. Expect the wrist spinners to get a bit more out of this pitch. There’s not much in it for the finger spinner,” reckon Sunil Gavaskar and Harsha Bhogle.
Bangladesh skipper Najmul Hossain Shanto won the toss and chose to bowl first with one change in the team as Jaker Ali comes in for Taskin Ahmed. Indian skipper Rohit Sharma batting first made no changes to the Playing XI .
India makes fast start in the Powerplay courtesy Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma
Having asked India to bat first on what looked a pretty good surface, Bangladesh started proceedings with Mahedi Hasan’s offspin and Shakib al Hasan’s left-arm spin.
The move seemed to be back-firing when Shakib was taken for 25 runs off the nine balls he bowled, including conceding a 97-metre six to Rohit, but the veteran spinner came back well and accounted for the wicket of the India captain with his tenth delivery and had him caught at extra cover. Virat Kohli, looking good at the crease once again, capped off a productive PowerPlay for India, their highest this edition.
Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli as a partnership has won many a match for India, but at this T20 World Cup, they are yet to click. There was even a moment’s confusion when they were running between the wickets, Rohit unsure of whether there was a single on to midwicket’s right. It was stop-start but they eventually got the run.
The team will hope the same thing happens to them as the tournament goes on because pairing them together at the top of the order is allowing India to pack their middle order with six-hitters. That advantage is helping them post par-plus totals in tough conditions.
The Tanzim and Pant show lits up the middle overs
When Kohli welcomed leggie Rishad Hossain with a six, it looked like the batter was set for the long haul. But Tanzim Sakib had other ideas. The pacer saw Kohli running down the track and beat him on length, bowling him as a result. Suryakumar Yadav fell edging behind in the same over after having opened his account with a six. And suddenly, the pressure was on India to rebuild.
It started with Rishabh Pant nurdling around his first 20 runs before laying into Mustafizur Rahman with a couple of fours and a six in the 11th over. Rishad came in for similar punishment but benefited from Pant playing one shot too many and holing out to short third man, falling again to the reverse sweep. But the wicketkeeper-batter had done his job, allowing India to score at 9 runs per over in the middle overs.
Tanzim Hasan did as much as he could to mess with that plan. He was Bangladesh’s best bowler and he earned that mantle by doing the one thing a big-hitter hates. He was unpredictable. Kohli came charging to meet him but he did the batter with change of pace and let him have it with a send-off. Suryakumar Yadav managed to get a six away first ball but was overwhelmed by extra bounce the next delivery.
Tanzim’s slower balls gripped and misbehaved off the pitch. And when he went on-pace, he made sure to hit the pitch hard to extract variation in bounce.
Rishabh Pant was the Firestarter. After India went from 71 for 1 to 77 for 3, they suffered nine balls without a boundary. Sometimes, in good batting conditions, that’s the price you pay. These weren’t good batting conditions. The pitch and the outfield were slow. They couldn’t wait till the death overs to make up the difference.
Fully aware of that, Pant, who was 12 off 15, burst to life. A left-hander’s cover drive is usually a thing of beauty but the one that Mustafizur had to endure was something else. It was power stripped to its purest essence. It was chilling. Pant hit five boundaries in eight balls and fell looking for another one.
Rishad Hossain will no longer be denied. Having had to wait because the culture in Bangladesh does not rate wrist spinners, (even as the rest of the world made it plain they were game-changers) he has arrived at this T20 World Cup as their most exciting cricketer. His dismissal of Pant secured Bangladesh their best period of play in this game – 2.4 overs of singles and dots between the 12th and the 15th.
He took two wickets as well, both of batters looking to attack him. Pant caught off the reverse sweep and Dube bowled neck and crop. He may have given a few runs away but he never took a backward step. Not even when he had to bowl one of the death overs.
Hardik Pandya and Dube muscle India to 196/5
Hardik Pandya broke India free of their second lull. They were 120 for 4 at the start of the 15th over. He was 6 off 7. Then he got a gift from Mahedi Hasan – a long hop with room to free the arms – and that was that. A lot of his power game comes from having incredible strength in his core and in his forearms. That’s why he’s able to hit even yorkers for boundaries.
That’s why he doesn’t always need a full swing of the bat. That’s why Hardik Pandya should be a little more adventurous than Hardik Pandya lets himself be now. Although Hardik Pandya came in only in the 12th over, and had faced only 18 deliveries by the 18th, Hardik Pandya’s ability to access the boundary – each of the four that came in the last two overs were off Hardik Pandya’s bat – helped Hardik Pandya score a fifty.
This was the kind of innings India could never imagine. Even the stats bore that out. Only once before, in their entire history of T20Is, had they made more than the 196 they did on Saturday with none of their top five batters scoring a fifty. They’re usually freight trains, slow to start, but steadily picking up steam. At this World Cup, they’re finding a new identity. Four of the seven batters who went out there scored at a strike rate of 150 or more. Twenty-eight balls was the longest anyone spent in the middle because everyone was looking to take risks.
All three sixes that Dube hit were in this phase of the game, setting the tone for India’s strong display in the final five overs. And once he was undone by Rishad and bowled through the gate, Hardik Pandya stepped up and scored a 27-ball fifty, hitting 4 fours and 3 sixes on the way.
India’s tally of 13 sixes went past their previous highest tally of 11 in a T20 World Cup match, against England in Durban 2007. Mustafizur was one of the bowlers to bear the brunt of it, and proved expensive with his figures of 0 for 48. In contrast, Tanzim bowled his four overs for 2 for 32.
India keep Bangladesh in check in the Powerplay
That Bangladesh were left short of India’s tally in the first six overs was down to Jasprit Bumrah’s frugal spell of 2-0-6-0. He could have had a wicket too if Pant had caught Tanzid Hasan behind the stumps but India had the breakthrough they wanted in the over before, thanks to Hardik Pandya who took the pace off and had Litton Das caught at deep square leg. Rohit’s ploy to bowl Axar Patel didn’t quite work but India had Bangladesh in check despite their highest opening partnership (35) in this edition.
Bangladesh’s opening partnership had provided only 13 runs in five previous innings. Given how crucial it is to start a big chase well, they were already at a handicap. Tanzid Hasan, coming off back-to-back ducks, finished less than a-run-a-ball. Litton Das didn’t survive the powerplay, although he was done in by a lovely slower ball from Hardik Pandya, who also made sure to drag the off break wide of the right-hand batter’s hitting arc, securing a mis-hit that was caught at deep midwicket.
Kuldeep Yadav spins out Bangladesh in the middle overs
A batting team at 67 for 2 after 10 overs should have put up more of a fight but Bangladesh ran into Kuldeep Yadav and never recovered. The googly caught Tanzid unawares for 29 off 31. The leg break had Towhid Hridoy lbw on the slog sweep. And finally, he was also up to task when Shakib Al Hasan was looking to hit him out of the ground. A simple shift of line slightly wider outside the off stump messed with the left-hand batter’s hitting arc and had him caught at cover.
On a surface with some sharp spin and bounce for the spinners, Kuldeep Yadav proved to be a handful for Bangladesh’s middle order. Not only was he hard to score against but also proved incisive, picking Tanzid Hasan and Towhid Hridoy lbw before getting Shakib caught at cover and finishing with figures of 3 for 19.
Only two overs of pace were bowled by India in this phase, both by Hardik Pandya, whose two overs saw 22 runs scored. With the spinners, it was a different story. It once again underlined Bangladesh’s struggles against spin at this World Cup; they have now lost 21 wickets to spin in this edition, the most by any team.
Pacers wrap it up for India once Again
Bangladesh actually ended up attacking more balls than India did in this game – 49 to 48 – but a lot of them were panicked swings. It goes to show that clarity is crucial in T20 cricket. Kuldeep denied them that because they couldn’t pick the ball out of his hand. Jasprit Bumrah played his part as well, 15 of his 24 deliveries yielding dots along with two wickets.
Once the spinners dented Bangladesh in the middle overs, the game was under control for India. Their pacers then came back and polished off the game for them. Bumrah, coming back to bowl his second spell, picked Nazmul Hossain Shanto with his third delivery and then returned for his final over to cut short Rishad’s cameo at 24 off 10. Arshdeep added the wickets of Jaker Ali and Mahmudullah as Bangladesh failed to even get past 150 after opting to chase.
Presentations and Road Ahead
Najmul Hossain Shanto the loosing skipper said : We were thinking about 160-170 when we put them into bat, but they batted well so credit to them. [on the weather and wind] I don’t think that is an issue, the players are habituated to that. We did not show as much intent as we needed with the bat, when we are chasing 190, we needed to show more intent especially in the first six. I try to contribute but need to finish the games.
Tanzim Sakib in this tournament has done a great job and happy for Rishad too, we have been looking for a good leg spinner for a long time now.
Rohit Sharma the winning skipper said : [on playing aggressively with bat] I have been talking about this for a long time now. It’s about going there and putting that into work. Considering everything we played really well, adapted to the conditions. There’s a little bit of wind factor here, overall we are very smart, overall we were good with bat and ball. All eight batters need to play their role, whatever it is.
We saw one guy get 50 and we got 197, in T20 I don’t believe we need to get fifties and hundreds, what matters is the pressure you put on the bowlers. All the batters from the word go played like that and that’s how we want to play as well. There is a lot of experience in the squad and we back them. [on Hardik] I mentioned in the last game as well, him batting well puts us in a good stead.
We want to finish well after the top 5, 6, Hardik being Hardik we know what he is capable of. He is a very important player for us, if he can keep doing that, it will put us in good positions. Excitement and if we discuss something with the bowler and when it comes off, it’s nice. Everyone when it came to our bowling adapted well and we discussed those things and they did well.
Hardik Pandya Player of the Match for his all round effort said: We have played really good cricket. More than anything we have stuck together and executed our plans. I did realize the batters wanted to use the breeze, I made sure I did not give them a chance where the wind was blowing, it was about being one step ahead as a batter.
We as a group can get better in a lot of places, losing wickets in bunches is something we can rectify and get better at, apart from that, we are looking good. I have been fortunate to play for the country, it was a freak injury I had, I wanted to come back but God had other plans. I was talking to Rahul [Dravid] sir the other day, and he said: Luck comes to people who work hard and that has stuck with me for a long time.
India win by 50 runs and have one foot and two hands into the semis. At the innings break, Aaron Finch was asked if this target can be chased down and he categorically ruled it out. And India put in a professional performance to prove him right. 197 was always going to be a mountain to chase on this and the powerplay was crucial. Bangladesh did not get the quick score they needed to put pressure on India and once the ball got soft and the spinners came in, it was hard to put the ball away.
Shanto tried as he hit a couple of sixes in one Hardik Pandya over but India never allowed the rate to go down. Kuldeep bowled a wonderful spell and the others just did their jobs to perfection. The fielding too was quite good with catches taken to go with good ground fielding. Bumrah was again outstanding and India look a well-rounded outfit in these conditions.
India march on as they stay unbeaten in the tournament. They are all but confirmed for the semis where they will play in Guyana. By the time India wakes up on Sunday, it is possible their team might have qualified for the semi-finals of the T20 World Cup 2024. They were too good for Bangladesh in Antigua, a total of 196 built by series of quickfire cameos in defiance of a slow pitch carrying them through to victory by 50 runs. If Australia beat Afghanistan, both they and India will move into the final four.
Both teams have only a day’s break before they play their final Super 8 matches. India take on Australia in St Lucia whereas Bangladesh play Afghanistan in St Vincent.