India thrash UAE by nine wickets and with 93 balls to spare to open Asia Cup campaign on a high in Dubai after bundling them out for just 57; spinner Kuldeep Yadav shines with 4-7, while Shivam Dube claims 3-4
Kuldeep Yadav (third from left) celebrates with teammates after dismissing UAE skipper Muhammad Waseem. Pic/Getty Images
India laid down the marker at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium with a powerhouse bowling display that reduced their T20 Asia Cup Group A contest against UAE to one-way traffic all the way.
It might be tempting to write off this as only having come against the 15th-ranked team in the world, but Wednesday’s effort must have been taken note off by the other contenders, of whom India will next take on Pakistan at the same venue on Sunday.
UAE opener Alishan Sharafu is clean bowled by a Jasprit Bumrah delivery. Pic/PTI
Bumrah sparks off collapse
Overmatched and outclassed, UAE lost their last eight wickets for just 10 runs in 30 deliveries to be shot out for 57 in 13.1 overs, failing abjectly to make anything of a promising start provided by Alishan Sharafu, the young opener who played a few handsome strokes before being yorked by Jasprit Bumrah. The wreckers-in-chief were Kuldeep Yadav (4-7), the left-arm wrist-spinner playing his first T20I game since last year’s World Cup final, and Shivam Dube, whose brisk medium-pace brought him career-best figures of three for four.
India needed just 4.3 overs to knock off the target and complete a nine-wicket drubbing, reaching 60 for the loss of Abhishek Sharma’s wicket. By then, the left-hander had hammered two fours and three sixes on his way to a breezy 16-ball 30 while adding 48 for the opening wicket with new partner
Shubman Gill.
Spin-heavy attack
India’s poor run at the toss ended when Muhammad Waseem called wrong, and Suryakumar Yadav had no hesitation in sticking UAE in. India sprang a surprise by retaining faith in Sanju Samson behind the sticks and going in with just one specialist pacer, thereby fielding both Kuldeep and Varun Chakravarthy, their wrist-spinning strike-force.
Sharafu, who has made a name for himself with his aggressive stroke-play, smashed Hardik Pandya for two fours in the first over of the contest, whipped Bumrah behind square for another four and drilled Axar Patel inside-out over cover for six to briefly entertain a disappointingly small crowd until Bumrah sent him packing with a peach of a yorker. Alongside Waseem, Sharafu was only one of two batters to reach double-figures. The rest cut a sorry figure, unable to fathom the mysteries of Kuldeep and Chakravarthy, used very sparingly.
Waseem took three fours off Bumrah’s third over — all inside the Powerplay — but that was as good as it got for the local favourites. Kuldeep winkled out three wickets in his second over, the last of them with a peachy wrong ‘un that gushed past the left-handed Harshit Kaushik’s inside edge to hit off-stump. Dube, brought on in the 11th over, took centrestage thereafter, working up decent pace and finding just that little bit of seam movement to keep the batters honest.
Fittingly, Kuldeep took the final wicket to make up for the frustration of not getting a single game on the five-Test tour of England, rounding off a wonderful evening for the bowling group, whose discipline — there were just two wides — must have pleased bowling coach Morne Morkel.
57
UAE’s score vs India, their lowest-ever in T20Is
Brief scores
UAE 57 all out in 13.1 overs (A Sharafu 22; K Yadav 4-7; S Dube 3-4) lost to India 60-1 in 4.3 overs (A Sharma 30) by nine wickets
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