Virat Kohli showcased his penchant to lord over Pakistan in ICC tournaments over again because the batting icon’s glittering unbeaten 100 helped India claim an authoritative six-wicket win over their traditional rivals and all but seal a semifinal spot within the Champions Trophy here on Sunday. The victory ought to be enough for India, who at the moment are on top of Group A with 4 points, to make the last 4. Nevertheless, Pakistan are watching early elimination from the eight-team event after their second successive loss.
Chasing a tough 242, India rode on Kohli’s 51st ODI ton, Shreyas Iyer’s classy 67-ball 56 and Shubman Gill’s good start of 46 off 52 balls to overhaul the goal with greater than seven overs to spare.
Kohli rebelled against his own modest recent form and a dangerous opposition to peel off a memorable knock that took 111 balls and was punctuated with seven fours.
Pakistan, however, are on their way out of the tournament of which they’re the hosts.
Once more, they bumped into their old nemesis — Kohli. The 36-year-old had several demons of his own to tame — a lean run, recurring type of dismissals and struggles against spin.
But he slayed each one in all them, in a fashion befitting a batter who also became the quickest to 14,000 ODI runs throughout the course of the knock.
Pakistan may need hoped to hustle him a bit through pacers Shaheen Shah Afridi and Haris Rauf.
But Kohli drove them on the up with elan or pulled them with audacity as Pakistan’s premier pacers transformed into dejected figures after the early high of Afridi castling Rohit Sharma (20 off 15 balls) with a peach of a yorker.
Perhaps, the largest hope Pakistan harboured against Kohli would have been leg-spinner Abrar Ahmed, considering the Indian’s recent travails against England’s Adil Rashid.
Kohli did have a few tough moments against Ahmed but none large enough to place him in distress. He largely handled him in singles, cutting down risks.
However the Pakistan quicks offered him enough possibilities to free his arms.
At the opposite end, Iyer flowed with a wide range of shots but a 103 metre six off spinner Salman Agha was the standout hit during his tenure, through which he assisted Kohli to lift 114 runs for the third wicket.
Iyer needed to walk back to the hut after Imam-ul-Haq pulled off a stunner at covers off spinner Khushdil Shah although replays suggested that the ball may need been grounded.
But by then, India had already shut the door on Pakistan.
A big chunk of credit for this win will also be rightfully claimed by Indian bowlers, who were stunningly accurate while limiting Pakistan to 241.
That total was made possible by Saud Shakeel’s polished fifty and Khushdil’s cameo.
Shakeel (62, 76b, 5×4) was largely untroubled and added 104 runs for the third wicket with skipper Mohammad Rizwan (46), but Pakistan never really managed to interrupt the shackles after opting to bat.
The pitch expectedly grew slow once the match entered the center passage, and the precision of Indian bowlers made run-making a laboured task with left-arm wrist spinner Kuldeep Yadav leading the best way (3/40).
There was a period in Pakistan innings when each Rizwan and Shakeel failed to seek out the boundary rope for 55 consecutive deliveries.
They were forced to traverse a cautious path due to early departure of Babar Azam (23) and Imam (10).
Azam looked million dollars while playing those trademark cover drives for a number of boundaries off Harshit Rana and Hardik Pandya.
But that desire to drive brought his doom as well. Pandya immediately pulled the length back after getting driven for a 4 and Azam’s full-throttle shot took an edge to KL Rahul’s big gloves.
Soon, Imam took off for a non-existent single and Axar Patel at mid-on just needed to hit the stumps, which he did.
At 47 for 2, Pakistan had their task cut out in a high-pressure match but Rizwan and Shakeel brought some stability to their innings with composed knocks.
India also had a few worrying points at this stage as veteran pacer Mohammed Shami and skipper Rohit Sharma had to remain off the sphere for a while.
Shami needed to are likely to his shin while Rohit looked in some discomfort primarily due to heat here. Nevertheless, each of them returned to the sphere to allay the concerns.
Rizwan’s adventurous shimmy down the track against Axar saw him losing the stumps, and from thereon Pakistan went on a downward spiral.
Shakeel, who played the pull with some conviction, perished to the identical shot against Pandya, skying a straightforward catch to Axar within the deep.
Salman, Afridi and Naseem Shah fell to Kuldeep’s guile as India tightened their grip.
Khushdil (38, 39 balls) played a pair of huge shots, including the primary six of Pakistan innings, that helped his side reach a healthy total but Kohli’s brilliance was too high to match on the night.
(Aside from the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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