ICC Battle for Supremacy
Pakistan v England
Match Three, Dhaka
Pakistan Strike Back!
Pakistan needed to make a breakthrough and fast if they had any chance of restricting the English to a score below 320. Fortunately for Pakistan, Strauss was out 3rd ball of Umar Gul?s new spell. He top edged a straight forward leg stump half volley trying to smack the ball for six but ended up being an easy catch for Umar Akmal at square leg.
His opening partner was soon to follow as indecision resulted in a run out; Kieswetter swept the ball straight to midwicket and took off without calling. He was sent back by Bell but it was too late, Akmal had already whipped the bails off. Kieswetter was looking good for a big score but now he just seemed to have wasted too many balls for his 63.
After all that hard work, the batsmen gave their wickets away and now with two new batsmen in and the scoreboard reading 129/2, Pakistan were slightly ahead and they knew this too. Afridi decided to bring Akthar back into the attack and he was generating some serious pace! He broke the record he set himself back in the 2003 world cup not once but twice. He bowled a ball at 162.2 km/h which he then topped again to 162.3 km/h beating the record by 1 km/h. But it wasn?t just about the pace, he was consistently bowling over 155+ in and around the stumps causing huge trouble for the batsmen and testing out their technique. Many balls were left and others edged through the vacant slip/thirdman area.
But, the batsmen were still able to capitalise on the spinner at the other end. This meant that they were still managing to go at 4 runs an over without too much risk although Akthar did clean bowl Pietersen unfortunately though it was a no-ball. Slowly but surely they weathered Akthar?s barrage and took advantage of the slower bowlers, a solid partnership bloomed.
The way cricket is; this wasn?t going to last for long. Just as the partnership gathered momentum, Bell smashed a loose ball from Afridi straight to short cover where again Umar Akmal took a blinder to dismiss Ian Bell for 24. Pakistan gained the upper hand again with only 12 overs left in the innings the next man in won?t have enough time to get set and this wicket could cause a collapse.
Pietersen however was looking good, he was picking up singles and two?s along with the occasional boundary. But yet another piece of miscommunication between the batsmen and Pietersen was a victim of another run out, he backed up too far and Ajmal the bowler had no troubles picking up the ball and hurling it at the stumps. This wicket had come at a most inopportune time, with just 10 overs left there were two new batsmen at the crease and the scoreboard reading 198/4 England had wasted their incredible start and it was now about reaching a suitable target around 270 with the batting powerplay still available.
Pakistan on the other hand have played the complete opposite of which they were before, taking blinders, direct hits and other pieces of good fielding. But the match will be decided here, if they let Collingwood and Morgan get away from them 300 would still be reachable with the batting powerplay and Freddie still left.
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