India vs Bangladesh: REDDY OR NOT
Bangladesh skipper Najmul Hossain Shanto had said his team had to perform better to stay in the series after a demoralising loss to India in Gwalior. The show they put on at the Arun Jaitley Stadium on Wednesday — India registering an 86-run win for an unassailable 2-0 lead in the series — was far from satisfactory.
In fact, the amateurish batting approach shown by Shanto’s team made it so easy for his counterpart Suryakumar Yadav that he started to experiment with his bowlers mid-match. Bangladesh’s chase of 222 runs was practically over by 5.1 overs when Parvez Hossain Emon, Shanto and Litton Das were all dismissed. Arshdeep Singh accounted for Emon, while Washington Sundar had Shanto holing out to mid-on and Varun Chakravarthy fooled Litton to castle him.
Yadav, knowing that the visitors were struggling to mount a challenge, then handed the ball to Abhishek Verma instead of regular bowlers Mayank Yadav and Hardik Pandya.
Verma, who bowls left-arm spin, yorked Towhid Hridoy in his first over itself. If Emon and Shanto, who started their innings with a flurry of boundaries, were guilty of losing their wickets while trying to force the scoring rate, the others were at fault for failing to steady the innings in the hope of making a dash at the end.
Even Riyan Parag, who was given a chance to roll his arms, managed to get his name in the wickets column. Parag dismissed Mehidy Hasan Miraz, who tried to hit over the covers but gave a straightforward catch to substitute fielder Ravi Bishnoi at long off.
Jaker Ali and Rishad Hossain, who was brilliantly caught by Pandya off the bowling to Chakravarthy, were dismissed in quick succession to leave Bangladesh tottering for 93/7. If not for a mature innings by Mahmudullah, who was playing his 140th T20I, the loss would have been even more embarrassing. He was the ninth batsmen to be dismissed after scoring a 39-ball 41.
Even all-rounder Nitish Reddy chipped in with two wickets as Bangladesh’s innings folded at 135/9.
If Bangladesh’s batting failed miserably to make use of the small boundaries, Indian batters accounted for 15 sixes to score a mammoth 221/9. The innings was based on a 108-run partnership between Reddy and Rinku Singh.
Reddy, playing his second T20I, plundered a 34-ball 74, which included seven towering sixes to demoralise the opposition bowlers. Rinku was equally swashbuckling with a 29-ball 53. The duo had to steady the innings first after India were reduced to 41/3 by the sixth over. After looking for singles in the initial overs, the duo started to open the arms as India raced to 100 inside 10 overs.
The plundering continued till Nitish was at the crease and the run rate never dipped below 10. Once he was dismissed, Pandya took over the hitting as he brought the innings past 200 with a 19-ball 32.
Brief scores: India: 221/9 in 20 overs (Reddy 76, Rinku 53, Hardik 32; Taskin 2/16, Mustafizur 2/36); Bangladesh: 135/9 in 20 overs (Chakaravarthy 2/19, Reddy 2/23).
