ANI
Gwalior
A clinical spell with the ball and a high-flying approach from the batters sealed a comfortable 7-wicket win for India in the opening T20I against Bangladesh on Sunday in Gwalior.
While chasing a paltry total of 128, the newly established opening duo of Sanju Samson and Abhishek Sharma didn’t waste a moment to establish an aggressive brand of cricket.
Samson opened the gateway to boundary fest with a sublime straight drive. With another drive on the final ball of the opening over to find the boundary rope, Samson perfectly set up the tempo of the chase.
The barrage of boundaries momentarily halted after the southpaw fell well short of the crease and got run out for a score of 16(7).
Suryakumar Yadav and Samson continued the onslaught on Bangladesh bowlers forcing them to go on the backfoot. In the final over of the powerplay, the Indian skipper nonchalantly smoked the ball across the boundary rope. But the next ball, Mustafizur Rahman’s good length delivery was enough to seal Suryakumar’s fate. The versatile batter went for a swipe, connected well but sent the ball straight to Jaker Ali at long leg. The all-round duo of Hardik Pandya and Nitish Reddy stayed till the end and saw off the chase with ease.
Scores: Bangladesh 127 (Mehidy Hasan Miraz 35*, Najmul Hossain Shanto 27, Towhid Hridoy 18; Arshdeep Singh 3/14) vs India 132/3 (Hardik Pandya 39*, Suryakumar Yadav 29; Mehidy Hasan Miraz 1-7).