India beat Bangladesh by three wickets. (Source: AP)
India beat Bangladesh by three wickets with no balls to spare to win the 2018 Asia Cup. In what turned out to be a riveting contest, the win was in the end orchestrated by some gritty batting from the Indian lower middle order. Defending a target of 223, Bangladesh managed to get rid of Shikhar Dhawan and Ambati Rayudu early in the innings. They then dismissed Rohit Sharma just as the Indian captain started looking dangerous. While Bangladesh kept picking wickets at regular intervals after that, carefully constructed partnerships like the one between veterans Dinesh Karthik and MS Dhoni, are what landed India a record-extending seventh title.
Kedar Jadhav hit the winning runs off the last ball.
Dhawan and Rayudu were dismissed for 15 and 2 respectively and India 46/2 after seven overs. Rohit Sharma then took the attack to the opposition and raced to 48. His innings included three fours and as many sixes but it was while attempting one such shot off Rubel Hossain that he ended up getting caught in the deep. MS Dhoni and Dinesh Karthik then weathered the charged Bangladeshi attack and carefully pieced together a 54-run partnership for the
Bangladesh got off to an absolute flier to their innings. Openers Liton Das and Mehedy Hasan Miraz razed the Indian bowlers in the first 20 overs to put up a 120-run partnership. Liton was the man who went after the bowlers and he reached his half-century in just 33 balls. Kedar Jadhav was the man with the important once again for India as he broke the opening partnership by dismissing Mehidy.
Liton Das scored a fantastic hundred. (Source: AP)
But the rest of the Bangladesh batsmen simply failed to turn up after that. Soumya Sarkar and Liton managed to stick around and rebuild the innings. Liton reached his maiden ODI century in that time and had managed to accrue 120 runs before being dismissed in the 41st over. Sarkar batted with the tail and pulled Bangladesh to their eventual total of 222.
To be updated