India beats Pakistan by 5 wickets to win cricket's Asia Cup with 2 balls remaining

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DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — India held its nerve in the last over to win cricket’s Asia Cup for the ninth time with a five-wicket victory over archrival Pakistan in Sunday’s final with only two balls remaining.

Tilak Varma scored 69 not out for India off 53 balls, including a crucial six against Haris Rauf in the 20th over.

Rinku Singh hit the winning runs with a four — the only ball Singh faced in the entire tournament.

Put into bat, Pakistan had earlier collapsed from 113-1 to 146 all out in 19.1 overs at Dubai International Cricket Stadium.

That looked like being enough after defending champion India’s terrible start to its innings, dropping to 20-3 after four overs, including the prized wicket of Abhishek Sharma (5).

But Varma and Shivam Dube (33) led the recovery as India reached 150-5 in 19.4 overs.

Varma added 57 off 50 balls with Sanju Samson (24) but the game-changing partnership was between Varma and Dube (33 off 22 balls). The duo added 60 off 40 balls to snatch the game out of Pakistan’s hands.

It was India’s second T20 Asia Cup victory after 2016, and ninth overall since 1984, across formats.

This was the first India-Pakistan final in Asia Cup history, which started in 1984. The two sides had already met twice earlier in this tournament – in group play and Super Four — both won comfortably by India.

India’s cricketers refused to shake hands with Pakistan after both those games and there were no handshakes at Sunday’s toss or at the end of the game.

India’s chase got off to the worst possible start with a rare failure for aggressive opener Sharma. He was out caught for five off Faheem Ashraf.

Ashraf struck again to send back Shubman Gill for 12, while Shaheen Afridi got rid of skipper Suryakumar Yadav for just one.

Yadav’s miserable tournament ended with a total of 72 runs, while Sharma finished as the top run-scorer – 314 runs in seven innings at average 44.85 and strike-rate 200.

But India was in deep trouble at 36-3 in the powerplay. Varma and Samson calmly rebuilt the innings without taking unnecessary risks. Samson faced 21 deliveries and only hit one six.

Samson was out in the 13th over, caught off spinner Abrar Ahmed, leaving India still needing another partnership.

Varma and Dube met the challenge. Dube hit two sixes and two fours, while Varma reached 50 off 41 balls.

Overall, Varma hit three fours and four sixes. He stayed calm even when Dube was out in the penultimate over.

Rauf bowled the final over with India needing 10 more runs for victory, and Varma got eight of them off the first two balls – including his fourth six. Singh then finished off with two balls to spare.

Earlier, Pakistan fumbled a great start and lost its last nine wickets for 33 runs in 39 deliveries.

Sahibzada Farhan (57 runs in 38 balls) and Fakhar Zaman (46 in 35) had given Pakistan a solid start at 84-0 but No. 3 Saim Ayub (14) was the only other Pakistan batter to reach double figures. Farhan hit five fours and three sixes.

Left-arm wrist spinner Kuldeep Yadav took 4-30 in four overs. Jasprit Bumrah, Varun Chakravarthy and Axar Patel claimed two wickets each.

Bumrah claimed the last wicket as Pakistan’s innings ended in 19.1 overs.

Pakistan had enjoyed the powerplay – scoring 45 without loss — and was 87-1 at the halfway point.

Farhan reached his 50 off 35 balls – his second of the tournament and also against India. Chakravarthy got the breakthrough as Farhan was caught in the deep in the 10th over. Even so, Pakistan was past 100 in 11.2 overs and looked set for a good score.

Kuldeep Yadav started the fightback in his second spell of two overs.

“They had a great start at like 100-1. But we knew if you get a couple quick wickets, new batters will find it tough to carry the momentum," the spinner said. “I was bowling my final over and looking to get them out.”

He broke the back of Pakistan’s innings, dismissing Salman Agha (8), Shaheen Afridi (0) and Ashraf (0) as the lower-middle order wilted under pressure. The turning point had come when Zaman was out caught in the 15th over against Chakravarthy.

The Asia Cup has marked a resumption of cricket ties between India and Pakistan only months after the neighboring countries were engaged in a tense border situation in May that disrupted the IPL and the Pakistan Super League.

There were no handshakes at Sunday’s toss where India skipper Suryakumar Yadav spoke with former India cricketer-turned-broadcaster Ravi Shastri and Pakistan captain Agha talked with former Pakistan cricketer-turned-broadcaster Waqar Younis.

Pakistan had named an unchanged team for the match while India all-rounder Hardik Pandya missed out owing to a niggle, replaced by Rinku Singh. Bumrah and Shivam Dube returned for India with Arshdeep Singh and Harshit Rana out.

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