Zaheer powers India to a clean sweep

By Rahul Bajaj
for Cricketain.com

Published: January 28, 2010

commentComment     Email This Post Email This Post     Printable version

Zaheer powers India to a clean sweep thumbnail

Mirpur: India’s pace spearhead Zaheer Khan produced a destructive spell of swing bowling to run through Bangladesh with a career-best haul of 7 for 87 as India thrashed the hosts with a comprehensive 10-wicket victory in the second and final test to complete a 2-0 clean sweep in the series.

Bangladesh, who had put up a strong fight on Tuesday, were blown away on the fourth day by Zaheer Khan’s masterful display of reverse swing. Resuming on their overnight score of 228 for 3, the hosts in fact saw through the first hour of the day without any hiccups.

Harbhajan Singh got India their first breakthrough on the fourth day when he removed Shahadat Hossain. India’s other spinner, Pragyan Ojha, followed up the wicket of Hossain with Mohammad Ashraful getting him to edge one to Dhoni.

Bangladeshi skipper Shakib Al Hasan came in and started his innings with a straight six off Pragyan Ojha but played one shot too many when he was caught at square-leg by Gambhir off Ojha.

At 301-6, Bangladesh were down but definitely not out with two of their leading scorers in the series, Mushfiqur Rahim and Mahmudullah Riad still to bat. But Zaheer Khan just quashed any chance of another lower order resistance for the home side when he scalped three wickets in four balls in the penultimate over before lunch as Bangladesh went from 301-6 to 304-9.

Zaheer came back after lunch to pick up his seventh wicket of the innings as Bangladesh were bowled out for 312, giving India a target of 2 runs to win. It was a dramatic collapse as the home side lost their final seven wickets for just 22 runs.

Needing just two runs to complete a series whitewash, neither Virender Sehwag nor Gautam Gambhir could open their account as Bangladesh conceded two runs as byes to lose the Test with more than four sessions to spare.

Zaheer was adjudged both Man of the Match and Man of the Series. He also became only the fourth Indian fast bowler to take 10 wickets in an away Test. Zaheer ended the second test with career-best match figures of 10-149, eclipsing his nine for 134 that came against England at Nottingham in 2007.

With this win, Indian skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s record of not losing a single Test as a captain remained intact.

Match Summary:

India 544 for 8 dec (Tendulkar 143, Dravid 111 retd hurt, Dhoni 89) and 2 for 0 beat Bangladesh 233 (Mahmudullah 96*, Ishant 4-66, Zaheer 3-62) and 312 (Tamim 151, Junaid 55, Zaheer 7 for 87) by ten wickets

Man of the Match: Zaheer Khan

Man of the Series: Zaheer Khan

Tagged with: , , , , , , ,


WPSN comments




Related News Headlines

Cricketain Latest