Asia Cup: India end league campaign with crushing win over UAE

Mirpur India on Thursday maintained their allwinrecord by producing yet another resounding performance tothrash minnows United Arab Emirates by nine wickets in a lopsided inconsequential round robin league match of the Asia CupT20 tournament here todayThe Indian juggernaut rolled on as they have now won nineout of the 10 T20 Inetrnationals played this year a very goodtrack record going into the ICC World T20Rohit Sharma in full flow during his innings of39 run off28 balls vs UAEduring the Asia Cup T20 tournament match at The ShereBangla National Cricket Stadium in Dhaka on Thursday PicAFPChasing a small target of 82 the Indians romped home inonly 101 overs with Rohit Sharma hitting a flurry ofboundaries in his 28ball39 In all he hit seven fours and asix adding 43 for the opening stand with Shikhar Dhawan 16not out which incidentally is the highest for India for thefirst wicket in this tournamentYuvraj Singh 25 no off 14 balls promoted up the orderat No 3 ahead of Virat Kohli to got a decent knock in themiddle He hit a few freeflowing boundaies including aneffortless six off Mohammed Shahzad Yuvraj finished the matchoff the first delivery of the 11th over with a boundary offShahzadDhawan however did not look fully confident as he wastested by a few rising deliveries that deviated off thesurfaceEarlier Indias reserve bench put up an impressive showto restrict UAE to a meagre 81 for nine after being asked tofieldUAEs total is the second lowest by an internationalteam without being bowled outBhuvneshwar Kumar 3L celebrates with teammates after the dismissal of unseen United Arab Emirates batsman Swapnil Patil during the Asia Cup T20 tournament match at The ShereBangla National Cricket Stadium in Dhaka on Thursday PicAFPUAE had no answer to Indias disciplined bowling effortwith the second string attack of Bhuvneshwar Kumar 28 in 4overs Jasprit Bumrah 123 in 4 overs Hardik Pandya 111in 3 overs Harbhajan Singh 111 in 4 overs and Pawan Negi116 putting relentless pressure on the inexperiencedopposition Even Yuvraj 110 in 2 overs chipped in with ascalpThis is the second time in the tournament that India hasrestricted the opposition to lessthan 100 totalThere was such distinct difference in standards that itturned out to be a no contest from the outset The totalnumber of dots conceded by UAE in the match was anunprecedented 77 deliveriesThe UAE team had neither intent nor stomach for a goodfight and it wasnt the kind of practice that the Indians werelooking for before the final against Bangladesh on SundayBhuvneshwar was economical in his first spell in which hebowled 15 dots and also got the wicket of Swapnil Patil 0who was promoted as an opener After playing eight consecutivedot balls he closed his bat face to an angular delivery onlyto find the leading edge that landed in the bowlers handsHis new ball partner Jasprit Bumrah was a touch quickerand a rising delivery outside offstump saw Mohammed Shahzad1 tentatively jab at it and the ball flew to Suresh Raina atsecond slipRohan Mustafas 11 approach and technique had novisible change despite his failures and the result was nodifferent in this match also After playing and missing forthe better part of his 22ball stay Mustafa was finallydismissed off a Pandya delivery giving Kohli a simple catch inthe covers UAE were reduced to 25 for threeHarbhajan playing his first match in the tournamentbowled decently with figures of 41111 He bowled 16 dotballs in his four over spellDebutant Negi IPLs most expensive Indian cricketer atRs 85 crore got his first international wicket when lefthanded Muhammad Usman 9 was holed out at longoff toHarbhajan while trying to hit a sixUAE skipper Amjad Javed 0 just lasted a ball when Negireturned the favour taking a catch of Harbhajans bowlingWickets fell at regular intervals for UAE with ShaimanAnwar showing some fight topscoring with 43 off 48 ballswith three fours and a six