da stake casino： Riaz Kail and Ali Asad led an inspired fightback to fire Pakistan into the final
da fezbet： The Bulletin by Andrew McGlashan in Colombo16-Feb-2006Scorecard
Ali Asad hits out during his 69 © ICC
Pakistan will take on arch-rivals India in the World Cup final afteroverwhelming Australia at the Premadasa Stadium. Their triumph representsa stirring revival after they had slumped to 80 for 5. However a stunningpartnership of 160 between Riaz Kail and Ali Asad powered them towards adaunting 287 for 9, then Australia’s much-vaunted top order failed todeliver in the face of a huge run-chase.Jamshed Ahmed removed the two key elements of Australia’s batting, TomCooper and Moises Henriques, in a fiery opening burst. Cooper has been keyin anchoring Australia’s batting efforts so his early demise was a hugeboost for Pakistan and when Henriques played an airy drive, the mainplayers were back in the hutch inside 10 overs.Henriques said the situation had affected some of his players: “We werecertainly on top of our game at that point and it’s unfortunate that wecouldn’t keep it going as we have done against the last few sides we haveplayed. It was the first time the guys had played under lights and maybethe pressure got the better of them.”But the real damage had been done in the second half of Pakistan’sinnings. Kail and Asad began by ensuring the team would have something todefend. Then, as their partnership and confidence grew the strokeplayexpanded, forcing Australia to retreat.Kail launched Pakistan back into life. He attacked the Australian spin pairingof Jack McNamara and Jon Holland, then as the field was pushed back, bothbatsmen ran well between the wickets, leaving Australia looking flustered.Mansoor Rana, Pakistan’s coach, always believed his side had the abilityto turn around the poor start: “We just needed a partnership and the twoin the middle-order did that with the rebuilding process. We have depth inour batting and just needed to go up to 35 or 40 overs and it workedreally well for us today. My bowling has been very good for the lastcouple of months and here our batting wasn’t really coming up to the markbut our bowling was superb.”Even when the pair were dispatched by Simon Keen in the 46th over – Kailfor a 99-ball 84 and Asad an 86-ball 69 – the swinging didn’t stop.Australia’s bowling figures, which had earlier been so impressive, took aserious hammering with Imad Wasim keeping the pace going until the endwith 29 off 15 balls.The shift in momentum was demonstrated as Pakistan hit the ground runningin the field. Australia couldn’t gain any foothold against the impressiveJamshed, while Anwar Ali bowled his ten overs straight through without anyluck. Usman Khawaja made a battling half-century from 65 balls, but couldnot find anyone to stay with him. Once he was dismissed the end was near.The lower order swished around, but the fight was going out of theAustralians. Each batsman trooped back with their head down knowing that,despite being one of the two best teams in the tournament, they weren’t goingto be making it to the final.
Pakistan celebrate an easy victory © ICC
Rana saved special praise for the efforts of his fielders. “Today I wasreally happy with the fielding. The nature of Pakistani people is thatthey do things when they are really required, and today was the example ofthat, but I wasn’t really expecting this fielding from them.”There had been a very different feeling for the first hour and a half ofthe day. Henriques and Adam Ritchard claimed two wickets apiece asPakistan’s batsmen displayed their wasteful side. Anwar Ali’s dismissalwas tinged with controversy as it appeared the slip catch to Finch hadn’tcarried, but the run-out of Rameez Raja was just plain careless as hechanced a second to David Warner in the covers.However, in exhilarating style, they found two heroes in the middle orderand their bowlers found the consistency to back up those efforts. ThePakistan supporters – finally some fans had turned up to watch thistournament – jumped for joy as the final wicket fell, but as the teamcelebrated they will have known the biggest challenge is two days away.How they were outPakistanMohammad Ibrahim c Wade b Ritchard 2 (9 for 1)
Nasir Jamshed st Wade b Ritchard 15 (26 for 2)
Ali Khan c Ritchard b Henriques 18 (62 for 3)
Anwar Ali c Finch b Henriques 1 (68 for 4)
Rameez Raja run out (Warner) 29 (80 for 5)
Ali Asad c Ritchard b Keen 66 (240 for 6)
Riaz Kail b Keen 86 (241 for 7)
Sarfraz Ahmed c Cooper b Henriques (262 for 8)
Jamshed Ahmed run out (Warner) 2 (284 for 9)
AustraliaTom Cooper c Sarfraz b Jamshed 1 (3 for 1)
Moises Henriques b Jamshed 8 (20 for 2)
Matthew Wade run out (Anwar Ali) 11 (53 for 3)
Aaron Finch lbw b Wasim 11 (99 for 4)
David Warner lbw b Malik 1 (104 for 5)
Usman Khawaja run out (Ali Asad) 59 (109 for 6)
Simon Keen st Sarfraz b Malik 3 (118 for 7)
Adam Ritchard b Malik 1 (122 for 8)
Tom Stray c Anwar b Wasim 10 (124 for 9)
Jon Holland lbw b Wasim 0 (124 all out)
