Dinesh Karthik turned finisher for India and clinched the match from right under the noses of the Bangladesh players. (Source: AP)
India needed 34 to win off the last 12 balls, Dinesh Karthik slammed 22 runs off that penultimate over. It didn’t matter that it was the first six balls of the match that he faced. He came, he saw the scoreboard and he got down to business. India then needed five to win off the last ball, Dinesh Karthik slammed a six. He propelled his team to a target of 167 with four wickets and no balls to spare in the most extraordinary fashion.
India got their chase off to a positive start with captain Rohit Sharma taking the attack to the opposition in the opening overs. Bangladesh ended up conceding 56 runs in the powerplay. But they also took the wickets of Suresh Raina and Shikhar Dhawan, both of whom were in good touch this series. These were wickets that would go on to bite India in the later stages.
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KL Rahul then came out and stuck on as his captain went berserk down the other end. While the two of them were batting, a victory for India seemed to be the only possible result of this match. But then Rahul got a top edge on a pull and put it down the throat of deep square leg. Bangladesh then closed in and the boundaries started drying up for India. The pressure also built gradually and that led to Rohit Sharma holing one at long-on. Manish Pandey and Vijay Shankar were then in the middle and the two were batting as differently from each other as two batsmen could. While Pandey was managing to keep the scoreboard ticking to the best of his abilities, Vijay Shankar struggled. The latter even played out four consecutive dot balls against Mustafizur Rahman in the 18th over before managing to rotate the strike. Pandey was dismissed off the very next ball and it looked like game over. But Dinesh Karthik had other ideas.
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The wicketkeeper, who has been in the fringes of the Indian team due to the presence of MS Dhoni, took the game by the scruff of the neck. Such was the assault that he launched on the Bangladeshi bowlers that there was little surprise that he won the man of the match instead of Rohit Sharma.
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Bangladesh reached their total thanks to a solid 77 by Sabbir Rahman. It is the highest score any Bangladesh batsman has managed against India in T20Is. Mahmudullah made 21 and could have made more had it not been an almighty mix up between him and Sabbir that led to his dismissal. The win means that India beat Bangladesh and hosts Sri Lanka to the Nidahas Trophy 2018.