Afridi confident Pakistan can beat South Africa

DUBAI: Dashing all-rounder Shahid Afridi on Sunday showed confidence Pakistan can pull off a one-day series win despite the return of Hashim Amla and Dale Steyn in the South African squad for the last three matches.

Afridi starred with 3-26 to add to his 20-ball 26 in Pakistan's comprehensive 66-run win in the second day-night international in Dubai on Friday which levelled the five-match series at 1-1.

Pakistan spurned a golden opportunity to win the first match in Sharjah on Wednesday, going down by one run from a winning position.

But Afridi, 33, said the way their bowlers were performing Pakistan can win the series.

"There is no doubt Amla and Steyn will strengthen South Africa but the way our bowlers are doing, I am sure we can beat South Africa," Afridi told reporters.

Amla reteuned to Dubai on Sunday after missing the second Test and the first two one-day games due to the birth of his child back home.

Steyn is likely to join the squad in time for the third match in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday after returning home for a rest before the one-day series.

The fourth match will also be played in Abu Dhabi on Friday while the fifth and final match will be held in Sharjah on November 11.

The teams will also play two Twenty20 internationals in Dubai on November 13 and 15.

Besides Afridi, off-spinner Saeed Ajmal took 2-15 and paceman Mohammad Irfan claimed 3-53 in the second match.

Afridi brushed aside criticism of failing to guide Pakistan to a win when only 19 runs were needed when he walked into bat in the first match.

"I got a bad ball which I hit and got out, it could have been a six," said Afridi who made only nine in that match.

"It's not Afridi versus South Africa, its Pakistan versus South Africa," said Afridi, who so far has 365 wickets in 364 matches.

He also has 7,395 runs, including a world record 37-ball hundred made against Sri Lanka in 1996.

Afridi said he was enjoying being part of Pakistan's squad.

"I am enjoying the game," said Afridi, who is also a former captain.

"This current team is a mix of seniors and juniors and I am feeling younger with each passing day," he said.

Afridi said he hoped Pakistan's batting will click in the remaining matches.

"The batting needs to be improved, its a matter of applying ourselves, like the way Ahmed Shehzad is playing, so I am sure improvement will come," said Afridi.

Shehzad scored 58 each in both the matches. (AFP)

Shamsur leads Bangladesh to clean sweep over NZ

FATULLAH, Bangladesh: Shamsur Rahman led Bangladesh to a stunning victory over New Zealand on Sunday, chasing down more than 300 to complete a 3-0 sweep of the one-day international series.

Shamsur's 96 rocketed the home side to 309-6, steaming past New Zealand's 307 with four balls and four wickets to spare at the packed Khan Shaheb Osman Ali stadium at Fatullah just outside Dhaka.

The 25-year-old opener hit seven fours and four sixes in his 107-ball knock as Bangladesh successfully chased down a 300-plus total for only the second time in their playing history.

Shamsur, playing only his second one-day international, fell short of what would have been a well- deserved century when his attempted drive off a Corey Anderson delivery became an edge and flew to wicketkeeper Luke Ronchi.

Naeem Islam continued to lead the charge after Shamsur's departure before he was run out for 63 after facing 74 balls.

Nasir Hossain (44 not out) stayed till the end to ensure Bangladesh never lost their way in the chase on the batting-friendly pitch.

Earlier, Ross Taylor hit his eighth one-day century as New Zealand posted their highest total in the series.

The visitors were desperate to avoid another humiliating whitewash, after their previous one-day series against Bangladesh.

Taylor, who was part of the New Zealand squad that lost 4-0 to Bangladesh in 2010, remained unbeaten on 107 while Colin Munro made 85 to give the tourists what looked like a fighting chance.

Taylor and Munro put on 130 for the fourth wicket after Mushfiqur won the toss and elected to bowl at the Fatullah ground, which was hosting its first international match for seven years.

Anton Devcich (46) and Tom Latham (43) had given New Zealand a decent start with a 66-run opening stand. But Bangladesh struck back soon afterwards through their spinners to reduce the visitors to 101-3.

Munro, playing his first match in the series, led the initial charge to complete his fifty before he fell to off-spinner Mahmudullah.

The two teams will now play a Twenty20 International on Wednesday in Dhaka before New Zealand fly to Sri Lanka for an ODI and Twenty20 series. (AFP)

TENDULKAR'S FINALE: CAN WE LEAVE HIM ALONE TO JUST PLAY CRICKET FOR TWO MORE GAMES? ( HARSHA BHOGLE )

This is like a movie you know will soon end but you just hope for another sub-plot. The last reel has begun to play, you can hear it whirring, you want to stretch the last few minutes…..

This is the Big Tendulkar Movie and it has been playing on our screens longer than any other. But end it must. Another story must be written, another character must light up our life. There is a reason that is the way of the world. Endings seem sad but they are essential and so they are good. Reality must give way to memories at the right time so they remain beautiful.

And Tendulkar, while remaining in our midst, must be a beautiful memory. As the mind drives an increasingly reluctant body, as the bat no longer vanquishes distant lands with impunity, as opponents who didn’t have a hope in hell sense an opportunity, you know this is the right time. We wish him to stay on but we do so out of selfishness. It is our need, our fix. We need a peg to hang our pride on, we need him to lend colour to our spectacle. But he is not the same person. Our rational mind knows it but we banish it. We are wrong.

Tendulkar has been the pivotal figure in my years of watching cricket. He started in 1989, my first tour to England was in 1990. I saw him as a child, as a young man, as a father and in the limited cycle of a sportsman’s life, as a senior citizen. I saw all the phases; each one gave way to another and they were all inevitable. As this one is. The excitement of waiting for Tendulkar to come out, the delayed visits to…well anywhere….while he was batting, the agony when he perished, the debates over whether the umpire was right….all that was a great phase. But there is apprehension now. You still sit on the edge of your seat, not out of impending thrill but out of concern. You only hope this is going to be the day where you once were sure it was. You wonder why more good balls are making their way towards him, why the uneven bounce reserves its spite for him. You bite your lower lip a bit more. And deep down inside, much as you fight with it, you know it is true, you know it is time.

Like all champions Tendulkar has challenged his decline. It knocked on his door, it stared him in the face and he vanquished it. In 2007, he was unhappy. Now, Tendulkar is never unhappy but then he was. He was already a legend, he had been on the road for eighteen years and the whispers were growing louder. He hit eleven test centuries in the next three years, produced one day international scores of 163, 175 and 200 and he won a World Cup medal, the one thing he craved for. Only a rare champion could have generated such a colossal second wind.

But now he is six years older and he is aware that even he can no longer arrest the march of time. The mind, strong as it is, cannot force the eye to continue seeing the ball a micro second earlier; cannot order the feet to dance down the track. Resolve can fight most things but not this. He knows it is time. Maybe it was time a little while ago but Tendulkar wasn’t yet done challenging it.

Now, he gears up for two more. It is a cricket match that we have converted into a festival, a Royal Wedding almost. We are all guilty of that because we seek a share of his limelight. It is too good an opportunity for us to let go. Everybody is loving a good retirement.

The old Sachin would have put his phone off the hook, put a ‘do not disturb’ sign on his door, loaded his favourite music, slipped on his headphones and by being immersed in the match ahead, would have been lost to the world. He might have talked to his family a bit but he would have talked to his bats more. His test match always began long before we saw him on the field.

Can he do it again? In Kolkata and in Mumbai? Can he shut himself from this grand wedding and look upon these as just two more games? Can he now? Can he produce more like that cover drive in Lahli that he would have been proud of at eighteen…….

But more important……can we leave him alone to just play cricket…..for two more games?

BANGALORE BIG BASH

For the first quarter of Rohit Sharma’s innings, there was little indication of the carnage to follow. Once he decided to switch gears after passing 50, the final One-Day International was headed only one way – India’s.

Actually, carnage does no justice to Rohit’s magical 209, a 158-ball feast that was in keeping with the festive atmosphere that gripped the M Chinnaswamy Stadium on Diwali night on Saturday (November 2). Carnage would indicate violence, mayhem, belligerence, naked aggression. Rohit’s wondrous essay, dotted with 12 fours and 16 sixes – the most ever in an ODI – was all about grace, elegance, timing and extraordinary skill, the ball not so much battered and pummeled as coaxed and cajoled way over the boundary ropes across various parts of the ground.

India motored to a gargantuan 383 for 6, by some distance the highest score of the series, but on a very good batting strip, a fast outfield, shorter boundaries and Bangalore’s elevation that makes the ball travel faster and longer, India could not take anything for granted, not after what has transpired in this series earlier.

James Faulkner decided to pay India back in the same coin, conjuring a memorable maiden ODI hundred off just 57 deliveries and putting on 115 for the ninth wicket with Clint McKay when all seemed lost. Faulkner’s effort, the fastest ODI ton by an Australian, kept his team in the hunt until the very end when he was well caught by Shikhar Dhawan in the deep off Mohammad Shami for a sparkling 116, signalling the end of the Australian resistance at 326. Ironically enough, Shami had kept the game alive by putting down Faulkner off R Ashwin when the batsman was only 20, with the total on 209 for 7.

The 57-run win, earned after several palpitations, gave India a 3-2 series triumph, the first time since 1986-87 that they had defeated Australia at home in a bilateral series where more than one game was played.

Australia had slumped to 138 for 6 despite a sensational blitzkrieg from Glenn Maxwell, and Shane Watson and Faulkner tonked the bowling around with casual arrogance, particularly against R Vinay Kumar, who became the first Indian to concede 100-plus in an ODI. Faulkner, who had hauled Australia to victory in Mohali, threatened an encore with crisp, clean, powerful striking, sending shivers among the fans and triggering a few tense moments within the Indian camp before victory was finally sealed.

After the mauling in the previous game in Nagpur on October 30 when India chased down 351 to level the series, George Bailey had hoped to hit it lucky with the coin in the final match. The Australian captain’s prayers were answered when he called right, but the script didn’t quite go to plan as Rohit sent Australia on a hiding to nothing, with one of the more spectacular innings in international cricket. If Australia hadn’t been at the receiving end, they would have gladly joined the rest of the audience in soaking in the entertainment.

Rohit became the third batsman in ODI history, after Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag, to score a double hundred, doing so with an effortlessness and an elegance that would have made his two illustrious predecessors proud. For his first 50 runs, Rohit was content to play second fiddle to Dhawan, who seemingly cannot put a foot wrong these days. The duo brought up their third century stand of the series to lay the perfect base for the middle order to build on.

Rohit was culpable of running out Virat Kohli, Bangalore’s adopted son and the most outstanding batsman of the series before now, for nought, an event that hardly endeared him to the holiday crowd. Once he set stall, though, he turned the fans around with a most silken display of spectacular batsmanship, making Australia pay the ultimate penalty for putting him down when on 120, substitute Moises Henriques the culprit at the deep backward square leg.

The fact that he battled through difficult periods and put his part in Kohli’s run out for zero behind him spoke volumes of his growing maturity. India looked to have sold themselves short with Suresh Raina and Yuvraj Singh failing to shrug off their recent lean trots, but Rohit and Mahendra Singh Dhoni first stabilised the innings and then provided the final push, adding 167 in just 94 deliveries with Dhoni, astonishingly, the more passive partner.

Rohit’s was a measured approach at the start, an approach that he has decided is the way to go at the top of the innings. He took 114 deliveries for his first 100, but then charged from 100 to 200 in just 42 more balls with eight further fours and nine more sixes. His tally of 16 sixes put to shade Shane Watson’s record of 15 against Bangladesh in 2011.

Rohit occasionally came out of his slumber to smash a six during his stand with Dhawan, but it wasn’t until later that he really sprang to life. That he was in the mood for hitting sixes became apparent when he moved from 52 in 72 deliveries to 85 in 87 with five giant sixes off Maxwell and Xavier Doherty in four overs, this after a 28-minute rain delay.

The Power Play overs between 36 and 40 produced only 22; it seemed as if Rohit felt it was insulting for him to require fielding restrictions to score quickly. Overs 41 through 50, though, produced a scarcely believable 151, the last five alone bringing 100 to leave Australia shell-shocked and the large crowd with sore throats and soaring hearts even as for once, Dhoni was relegated to a side show despite making a 35-ball fifty.

Australia were rocked in the second over when Shami beat Aaron Finch for pace and trapped him in front. With Watson having limped off the park with a hamstring injury earlier and not batting till No. 8, Australia pushed up Brad Haddin but Ashwin – who was the pick of the bowlers with a brilliant display all the way through – bowled an excellent first spell, accounting for both Haddin and Phil Hughes. Bailey, easily Australia’s batting hero with 474 runs coming into this game, was guilty of inexplicable ball watching and wondering if his partner would make his ground, and was caught short by Vinay’s presence of mind as he quickly fired the ball into Dhoni’s gloves.

That was about the only thing that went right for Vinay, who was clobbered by Maxwell and Watson with utter disdain. Maxwell teed off with a first-ball six off Ashwin, then just lay into Vinay with two fours and two sixes in an over, narrowly missing the fastest ODI half-century. It was, however, always on the cards that with so much required and so few resources left, he would perish trying one stroke too many, Vinay finding some consolation when Ravindra Jadeja took a top-edged pull.

Watson, somewhat hampered in his movements, decided there was no point doing his hammy further, again picking on Vinay and depositing him over the midwicket and long-on ropes thrice in as many deliveries.

The numbers for Saturday were completely in keeping with the trend witnessed throughout the series – 709 runs in 95.1 overs, 59 fours, 38 sixes. Now, why would you want to be a bowler at all?