Tuesday, February 28, 2012

England clinches T20 series from Pakistan in the hair-raisng last two overs

The last T20 match between Pakistan and England at Abu Dhabi's Sheikh Zyed International stadium was awesome, interesting and hair-raising in the final overs of the play Monday.

Electing to bat, England was contained by Pakistan's bowlers and they could only give a target of 130 to Pakistan to follow. Except for Pietersen's 62 (not out), no other Englishman could withstand the Pakistan's bowlers onslaught. Saeed Ajmal bagged four wickets for 23.

When it came to Pakistan, all seemed to be going well till the 18th over. Pakistan was well poised to win with 4-107 with 23 needed off the last three overs and 17 off the remaining two. But then the resilience and superb bowling performance from England did its magic. Dernbach and Broad took the three important important wickets, Misbah being the last to be drastically clean bowled to end the game. Pakistan lost by 5 runs. Afridi was run out for 3.

 KP Pietersen (England) rightly claimed both titles -  Player of the match  and  Player of the series for his outstanding performance as a batsman.

England squad proudly flies back after clinching both ODI and T20 trophies. Pakistan comes back with the Test Series trophy, but with a heavy heart of losing miserably the other two trophies. England does deserve a good pat for their superb performance, even after lost the test series - which give them more confidence to win. On the other hand, Pakistan's over confidence and poor batting made them lose the ODIs and T20s.



The match ended England's long tour of the United Arab Emirates who now fly to Sri Lanka in two week's time ahead of their two-Test series, while Pakistan are next in action in the Asia Cup, which begins on March 11.

Pakistan's managers, selectors, trainers and captains will now have to do a lot of homework, chalking out their future strategy, besides training their batsman who are continuously failing in the limited over matches. 

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