Pakistan beat Sri Lanka to lift ICC World T20

Pakistan has won the second edition of ICC World T20 by beating the more fancied Sri Lanka in the finals that was played at Lord’s on Sunday. Pakistan won the game by eight wickets and with eight balls to spare. They had finished runner-up in the first World T20 to India.

Sri Lanka won the toss and decided to bat first in a pressure final, but had a wobbly start to their inning. the hero of the tournament – and the man-of-the-series in the end – T.Dilshan was peppered with successive short balls in the very first over of Mohammad Aamer and a surprised Dilshan finally succumbed to them by offering a simple catch to the short fine-leg off the fifth delivery.

Jehan Mubarak’s promotion to the top of the order did not offer any rewards to the Sri Lankans, as he failed to tickle the scorers, while Sanath Jayasuriya smashed a six and a four before being bowled by Abdul Razzaq to leave the Lankans at 26/3. A lot was expected out of Mahela Jayawardene after a couple of decent knocks leading up to the knock-out games, but he edged one to the slips to give Razzaq his third wicket and Pakistan their fourth; Lanka 32/4 and in deep trouble.

Kumar Sangakkara eschewed all the risky strokes and managed to get a partnership going for the batting team with Chamara Silva, but the introduction of spinners slowed down their scoring greatly. It was only after Silva and Isuru Udana fell one after the other – Lanka at 70/6 – and Angelo Mathews joined his captain at the crease did the run-rate start to pick up.
Sangakkara played a defiant role, while Mathews took the role of the aggressor to get a move on, and a score that looked like it would not even reach 110 at one stage was propelled to 138/6 in the twenty overs. Sangakkara hit a half century, while Mathews scored an unbeaten 34 to guide their team to what was considered an in-between total; something that could have tested the Pakistanis in a pressure finals.

However, Pakistan began their innings on a refreshing note with Kamran Akmal been his usual attacking self, and Shahzaib Hasan giving him ample support. Hasan was a trifle slow to begin with, but the introduction of Ajantha Mendis saw him smash the bowler for a couple of boundaries. Akmal also hit Mendis for a six in his very first over, but was soon dismissed by Sanath Jayasuriya, while Hasan’s inning was ended by Muralitharan to get the Lankans back into the game; Pakistan 63/1 in nine overs.
This brought Shahid Afridi and Shoaib Malik to the crease, and the duo began calmly. The manner in which Afridi began the innings, slowly to begin and gathering momentum over the period, had most of the experts wondering whether this was the same batsman who had struggled to get ball onto the bat in the previous games. It took Afridi 20 balls to even attempt a big shot, and when he actually did it, it went sailing over the mid-wicket fence for a six off Murali. The next one was sent to the boundary for a four and this pushed the Pakistanis into contention.

Malik, at the other end, kept picking the singles and hitting the odd two with extremely good running between the wickets. 56 runs had been needed in seven overs before that counter-attack on Murali, and though a couple of tight overs from Mendis and Lasith Malinga brought it down to 33 in 24, the problem Sri Lanka had was that Pakistan never lost any further wickets.

They needed one good over to achieve the target, and with so many wickets in hand, and two well-set batsmen, it was a six and a four off Isuru Udana’s 18th that ended the Lankan hopes. Seven runs were needed off the last couple of overs, but only four balls were needed by the pair to complete a comprehensive win in the tournament.

Shahid Afridi’s 1/20 in the four overs and the unbeaten fifty won him the man-of-the-match award, while the man-of-the-tournament was T.Dilshan for his wonderful 300 plus runs.