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Tendulkar wraps up win for India

Sachin Tendulkar took five wickets as India beat Pakistan by 87 runs to win the first one-day international.

Virender Sehwag and Rahul Dravid both struck centuries as the home side piled up 281-8 on a flat wicket in Cochin.

Pakistan made a bright start but they fell well behind the asking rate after losing three wickets in as many overs.

Tendulkar ran through the middle and lower order and apart from 37 from Inzamam-ul-Haq and 42 from Mohammad Hafeez, there was little resistance.

The heavy defeat brought to a shuddering halt the momentum Pakistan had after winning the final Test in Bangalore.

They started brightly, however, after Indian skipper Sourav Ganguly had won the toss and chose to bat.

After Sehwag had been dropped by Hafeez at point off Mohammad Sami's first ball, Tendulkar mistimed a pull off Rana Naved-ul-Hasan and was snapped up by Yousuf Youhana at mid-on.

Ganguly was desperate for a good score but shuffled across his stumps the next ball and saw his leg-stump knocked out of the ground.

Sehwag had several lucky escapes early on - wicket-keeper Kamran Akmal spilled a difficult chance off Sami, and Shoaib Malik and Mohammad Hafeez failed to run him out when he was well short.

Dravid also survived a good shout for lbw off Sami but the two batsmen gradually gained in confidence and started to time the ball well.

Sehwag was predictably the more aggressive and smashed three sixes before bringing up his seventh one-day international century off only 84 balls.

He survived another run-out chance off Hafeez before Abdul Razzaq found a way through his tired defences.

With the heat becoming oppressive, the run-rate dropped dramatically in the last 10 overs amid a clatter of wickets.

Off-spinner Arshad Khan, who had taken some stick in his first spell, came back to dismiss Yuvraj Singh, Mohammad Kaif and Mahendra Dhoni in a hurry.

In between, Dravid - who was struggling to complete even the easiest of singles - found enough energy to achieve his century.

It was no surprise when Sami ran him out and Balaji was bowled by Arshad soon after, leaving the innings in real danger of folding with a whimper.

Even though 12 runs came off the final over, it was still much better for Pakistan than the prospect of a 300-plus target, which they were staring at when Sehwag and Dravid were motoring along.

The reply began confidently, with Salman Butt, in particular, timing and placing the ball excellently.

But a change in field-placing saw the first wicket fall as Ganguly - who had endured a torrid time - swapped places with Sehwag at short-point and the latter held a reflex catch off Balaji to remove Kamran Akmal.

Ashish Nehra bowled beautifully and struck in his first over when Butt fetched one from outside off-stump and pulled straight to Ganguly.

Shoaib Malik then cut Balaji to Yuvraj at point and Pakistan's fine start had been quelled emphatically in three overs.

It became worse when Zaheer Khan took a brilliant return catch to dismiss Yousuf Youhana and the pressure was now on Ganguly's opposite number.

Inzamam responded by producing a series of delightful cover drives but he became the first of Tendulkar's victims, his off-bail knocked off by the part-time spin bowler.

Hafeez finally got going after a pedestrian start and hit two huge sixes to give the tourists hope of a respectable total.

But there was little defiance or discipline from the others, witnessed by Abdul Razzaq's ugly swish at a Tendulkar full-toss which went straight to Sehwag at leg-gully.

Shahid Afridi is not usually the man for a crisis and he failed to last long, slog-sweeping Tendulkar to Zaheer at deep mid-wicket.

Tendulkar was soon celebrating his second five-wicket haul in ODIs - his previous one also came in Cochin - as a score of 146-7 became 152-9.

First Sami chipped a return catch to him and Hafeez's resistance came to an end when he tried to heave him over square and succeeded in finding Nehra.

Naved-ul-Hasan blasted a huge six during a spirited last-wicket stand with Arshad, before Zaheer cleaned him up to give India a 1-0 lead in the six-game series.

Toss: India
Umpires: BF Bowden (NZ) and AV Jayaprakash
TV Umpire: I Shivram
Match Referee: BC Broad (Eng)
Man of the Match: V Sehwag


India innings (50 overs maximum) R B 4 6
V Sehwag b Abdul Razzaq 108 95 9 3
SR Tendulkar c Yousuf Youhana b Naved-ul-Hasan 4 4 1 0
*SC Ganguly b Naved-ul-Hasan 0 1 0 0
R Dravid run out (Mohammad Sami) 104 139 6 0
Yuvraj Singh c Salman Butt b Arshad Khan 16 22 2 0
M Kaif c Shahid Afridi b Arshad Khan 7 15 0 0
+MS Dhoni c Naved-ul-Hasan b Arshad Khan 3 7 0 0
Harbhajan Singh not out 14 13 0 1
L Balaji b Arshad Khan 0 2 0 0
Z Khan not out 2 3 0 0
Extras (b 4, lb 5, w 13, nb 1) 23
Total (8 wickets, 50 overs) 281

DNB: A Nehra.

FoW: 1-4 (Tendulkar, 1.4 ov), 2-4 (Ganguly, 1.5 ov),
3-205 (Sehwag, 35.1 ov), 4-241 (Yuvraj Singh, 40.6 ov),
5-255 (Kaif, 44.6 ov), 6-260 (Dhoni, 46.3 ov),
7-265 (Dravid, 47.4 ov), 8-269 (Balaji, 48.5 ov).

Bowling O M R W
Mohammad Sami 8 1 42 0 (3w)
Naved-ul-Hasan 8 0 38 2 (1nb, 2w)
Abdul Razzaq 8.3 1 50 1 (1w)
Shahid Afridi 10 0 50 0 (1w)
Mohammad Hafeez 9.3 0 59 0
Arshad Khan 6 0 33 4 (2w)

Pakistan innings (target: 282 runs from 50 overs) R B 4 6
Salman Butt c Ganguly b Nehra 26 28 5 0
+Kamran Akmal c Sehwag b Balaji 17 17 3 0
Shoaib Malik c Yuvraj Singh b Balaji 4 5 1 0
Yousuf Youhana c & b Khan 0 8 0 0
*Inzamam-ul-Haq b Tendulkar 37 58 4 0
Mohammad Hafeez c Nehra b Tendulkar 42 75 1 2
Abdul Razzaq c Sehwag b Tendulkar 5 13 0 0
Shahid Afridi c Khan b Tendulkar 8 11 1 0
Mohammad Sami c & b Tendulkar 2 6 0 0
Naved-ul-Hasan b Khan 25 35 2 1
Arshad Khan not out 14 21 1 0
Extras (lb 4, w 3, nb 7) 14
Total (all out, 45.2 overs) 194

FoW: 1-45 (Kamran Akmal, 6.3 ov), 2-49 (Salman Butt, 7.6 ov),
3-49 (Shoaib Malik, 8.2 ov), 4-64 (Yousuf Youhana, 12.1 ov),
5-112 (Inzamam-ul-Haq, 25.6 ov), 6-129 (Abdul Razzaq, 29.6 ov),
7-146 (Shahid Afridi, 33.3 ov), 8-151 (Mohammad Sami, 35.2 ov),
9-152 (Mohammad Hafeez, 37.2 ov), 10-194 (Naved-ul-Hasan, 45.2 ov).

Bowling O M R W
Balaji 6 0 32 2 (2nb, 1w)
Khan 7.2 2 25 2
Nehra 6 2 22 1 (2w)
Harbhajan Singh 10 0 32 0
Tendulkar 10 1 50 5 (4nb)
Yuvraj Singh 6 0 29 0



Source bbc.com