Opening batsmen for England Alex Hales and Jos Butler displayed a record unbroken batting stand of 170 runs to beat cricket T20 World Cup favourites India in Adelaide last night Thursday 10 November storming into the final to play Pakistan on Sunday 13 November at the MCG.
Earlier Indian batsmen Virat Kohli with 50 and Hardik Pandya with 63 runs had set up a respectable total of 169 for England to chase up, however that proved to be not enough. Although the Indian team performed well in the qualifying matches, they lacked the zing in this match in all three departments of batting, bowling and fielding.
The unexpected result denied the most anticipated India-Pakistan finale at the tournament that the cricket fans were hoping and the respective Indian and Pakistani fans were gearing up to attend in Melbourne.
Instead this scenario is moving towards a repeat of the famous 1992 World Cup final at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) that the Pakistan cricket team won led by Imran Khan, the cricket hero turned politician.
During the earlier stages of first inning, English bowlers restricted Indian run-scoring with disciplined bowling and superb fielding. However, towards the later stages of the innings, Kohli and Pandya hit several boundaries and sixes to put up a good total to defend.
England openers started the chase by taking full advantage of the powerplay that India could not, taking 63 runs in a clear contrast to India’s 38-1 and continued with the onslaught with 4’s and 6’s till the end of their innings.
“It certainly feels like it’s as close to perfect as we can get, especially against such quality opposition, England captain Jos Buttler said after the match.
He further added, “It’s important for us to enjoy this and this performance so we will reflect on that and enjoy it, but there is one last dance to go.”
“This is pretty disappointing how we turned up today. We still batted well especially at the back end to get that score but we were not good enough with the ball, India captain Rohit Sharma concluded.
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