da dobrowin： India have established themselves as the team to beat in the Under-19World Cup with an emphatic seven-wicket victory in the quarter-finalagainst England at the Kinrara Oval
The Bulletin by George Binoy in Kuala Lumpur24-Feb-2008
Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
How they were out
Iqbal Abdulla picked up 3 for 29 © Getty Images
India have established themselves as the team to beat in the Under-19World Cup with an emphatic seven-wicket victory in the quarter-finalagainst England at the Kinrara Oval. It was their most commandingperformance of the tournament: the bowlers bowled with tremendousdiscipline to dismiss England for 146, and set up an easy target which was never in doubt after the openers put on 65 for the first wicket.The victory, achieved with 10.5 overs to spare, was set up by a relentlessbowling effort after Virat Kohli put England in on a slow wicket. Thenew-ball attack – Pradeep Sangwan and Ajitesh Argal – tied down England’sopeners during the first Powerplay and the pressure was maintained by theleft-arm spinners – Ravindra Jadeja and Iqbal Abdullah – who struckrapidly when the batsmen tried to go on the attack as the inningsprogressed.England’s batting had collapsed against Bangladesh in their final groupmatch and their approach today was extremely cautious. They did not loseearly wickets but the run-rate was poor. They built themselves a platformof 73 for 1 but it had taken 25 overs to get there. A slow start did notsolve their middle-order worries and another collapse, during which theylost nine wickets for 73 runs, had shut England out of the contest by thehalf-way stage.Although Sangwan went wicketless in his first spell, he bowledconsistently on and around off stump, shaping the ball away from left-handopener Billy Godleman, who concentrated on defending with a straight bat.Sangwan’s partner, Argal, moved the ball away from the right-hand JamesTaylor and rarely strayed in line. As a result, England crawled: Godlemantook 18 deliveries to get off the mark and when he finally did, it wasthrough an uppish drive that was dropped by Turuwar Kohli, diving to hisright at cover.England scored only 29 off the first ten overs. Taylor scored most of theruns but he had to take risks by moving across to flick the fast bowlersfrom middle stump. Argal struck the first blow soon after, seaming adelivery across Godleman to induce the outside edge to the wicketkeeper,Shreevats Goswami.The England captain, Alex Wakely, and Taylor added 42for the second wicket and while they were at the crease, England lookedlike building a platform for their middle order to capitalise on. However,left-arm spinner Abdulla drifted one in to Wakely who triedto flick across the line and was lbw for 18. From there it unravelledquickly for England.Taylor, on 41, attempted to pull Tanmay Srivastava’s offspin from outsideoff stump and played on, leaving England on 81 for 3. Abdulla and Jadejadried up the runs with a wicket-to-wicket line and went through theirovers in a hurry. Jadeja bowled Ben Brown, the one middle-order batsmanwho looked comfortable, as he tried to heave across towards midwicket andthe rest capitulated.Siddarth Kaul, the first-change seamer, also returned to pick up a coupleof wickets in his second spell. His first came in unusual circumstances:Liam Dawson missed a pull, lost control of the bat, and hit his stumps.The second, however, was the outcome of a lovely delivery: Kaul got theball to seam and bounce away from Greg Wood, a left-hand batsman, whotried to drive but got the edge to Goswami.
Ben Brown was the one England middle-order batsman who looked comfortable against the Indian attack © Getty Images
The only chance England had of defending such a small target was for theirnew-ball bowlers – Steve Finn and James Harris – to make deep inroads intoIndia’s solid batting line-up. Finn and Harris had troubled Bermuda,Ireland and Bangladesh in the group matches but they had no impact onIndia today.The openers, Turuwar and Goswami, were under no pressure from therequired run-rate and they bided their time against Finn and Harris. Finnstarted erratically with three wides and a no-ball in his first over whileHarris did not find the rhythm that brought him five wickets againstBangladesh. Turuwar and Goswami nudged the ball around for singles beforeTuruwar opened up with graceful cover-drives off Harris.England could have had a wicket in the third over when a direct hit frompoint had Goswami short of his crease but curiously nobody appealed.Goswami, who is the one Indian top-order batsman yet to make a significantscore, went on to score a patient 26. Srivastava and Virat went for theirshots and fell in the space of two overs but Turuwar stood firm and scoreda third successive half-century – his third of the tournament – to leadIndia home. He has now over-taken Srivastava as the World Cup’s leadingrun-scorer with 207 runs in four innings.India now await the result of the New Zealand-Sri Lanka quarter-final toknow who their semi-final opponents will be. Whoever their opponents are,they will have to do something special to upset India’s campaign that hasgrown stronger with every match.