Sport

Inzamam — a leader in every sense

Inzamam-ul-Haq displayed nerves of steel in fashioning a thrilling victory off the very last ball of the innings. The tension was almost tangible when Tendulkar was given the task of bowling the last over and pull off the impossible. But the Pakistani skipper was hardly ruffled by all the excitement around him and in fact sported a smile, as he got ready to face the last delivery. He stroked the final ball for a boundary nonchalantly and even that did not bring out any excitement from him.

Inzamam meant business immediately on his arrival by running aggressively between the wickets. Then, of course, he does not have to really make too much of an effort with the bat as batting comes naturally to him. Pakistan has levelled the series and Inzamam has proved to be a leader in every sense of the word with his fantastic effort.

The Pakistanis have proved that a huge target can be chased provided the top order batsmen contribute and put up partnerships. Afridi gave Pakistan a galloping start but he is one who is happy with setting the pace and the rest of the batsmen just fed on the Indian attack without taking any chances. There was a stage when it seemed that the Indians were expecting things to happen with the visiting batsmen picking up singles at will.

The Pakistani batsmen were not put under pressure and the strategy of the Indians left a lot to be desired. For instance, Karthik bowled mostly from over the wicket and it was inexplicable as to why he did that since he is not a big spinner of the ball. Moreover, he is the frontline spinner and should have been the aggressor. The ploy of bowling to a leg stump line from over the wicket is all right for a part-timer like Yuvraj. None of the Indian bowlers except Zaheer Khan made any impact on either Butt or Razzaq.

Razzaq provided the respite the Indians were looking for by picking the fielder in the deep off a full toss. Shoaib Malik and Inzamam upped the tempo with deft touch and effortless strokes through the gaps. Murali Karthik picked up the wicket of Malik after he decided to bowl round the wicket for a change. The Indians were patchy on the field with even Yuvraj dropping a sitter. However, Nehra brought about the twist in the tale by running Younis Khan and Akmal out. The effort from Nehra brought up a big change in the Indian ranks and the fielding standards improved but it came a bit late in the day.

Tendulkar was excellent in the deep and for one, who was dehydrated in the morning, the commitment was tremendous. Tendulkar had an exhausting day as he batted for most part of the Indian innings and though he was struggling towards the latter part of the morning he came out to field. Tendulkar needed a decent start and the wayward spell from Naved helped his cause. Naved, the hero of the last game strayed too much on to the pads of Tendulkar and a few early boundaries eased the pressure on Tendulkar.

The ball was not coming on to the bat but he adapted quickly enough by bringing in all his experience and determination. Tendulkar showed his aggressive streak at times during his century knock by charging down the track against the medium-pacers. Kaneria was given the rough treatment by Tendulkar which resulted in the leg-spinner spending his time out on the boundary. The century came for Tendulkar after a while and though he must be pleased about it, the match result would take much of the sheen off it.

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