India thrash Bangladesh by 28 runs, qualify for semis

Birmingham: A brilliant spell by Hardik Pandya (3/60), Jasprit Bumrah (4/55) and others, helped men in blue to march towards semifinal as they defeated Bangladesh by 28 runs in the world Cup match here at Edgbaston on Tuesday.

Bangladesh lost opener Tamim Iqbal early in their chase of 315 as they fought to stay alive in the World Cup. Tamim departed for 22 after chopping a ball onto his stumps. Bangladesh were on 73 for one after 15 overs, with Soumya Sarkar on 33 and Shakib Al Hasan 16 not out.

Soumya and Shakib added a couple of runs and kept the score board running but soon Bangladesh got another jolt from the opposition--when Pandya dismissed Sarkar on a score of 33 runs of 38 balls in 15.1 over.

Shakib continued with his play after Soumya's dismissal and Mushifiqur Rahim (24) added 47 runs before falling to Yuzuvendra Chahal in 23rd over.

It seemed that after Soumya's dismissal, Bangladesh batsmen were in hurry to join Soumya in the pavilion as none of the batsmen supported Shakib, who from the other end kept the  score-board running single-handedly, but soon ran out of the partners who from the other end could have supported him in the chase of 315.

Liton Das (22) and Mosaddek Hossain (3) were back to pavilion one after another. Hossain left Bangladesh 173 for five.

Still the journey was far and all the eyes and hope were on Shakib who was going fine with his bat under pressure, but in 33.5 over Pandya claimed his third wicket by dismissing Shakib. With Shakib's dismissal Bangladesh lost the key batsman who could have turned the match into his team's favour. He scored 66 runs off 74 balls decorated with 6 fours.

However, Sabbir Rahman and Mohammad Saifuddin fought hard and played handsomely to come back in the game by adding 66 runs together but in 43.1 over Bumrah took his second wicket when he dismissed Rahman. Again Bangladesh as from here nothing seemed to be in their's favour. Rahman scored 36 off 35 balls with the help of 5 fours.

Soon after Rahman's dismissal, Bhuvneshwar Kumar finally opened his account by dismissing Mashrafe Mortaza in 44.2 over. When Mortaza walked to the pavilion, Bangladesh were on 257 for eight wickets with Saifuddin still on the crease.

Saifuddin did a tremendous job though he wasn't supported from the other end. Like Shakib Saifuddin too, fell short of partners as the batsmen from the other end seemed to be crawling in the chase. If Saifuddin had got a well balanced partnership then definitely Bangladesh would have walked away with a win over India.

Finally, the rest of the job was done by Bumrah who dismissed both Rubel Hossain (9) while Mustafizur Rahman for a duck in 48th to clinch a 28 runs win against Bangladesh, who were all out for 286.(UNI)