A fine century from opener Gautam Gambhir steered India to a 46 run win over Bangladesh in the second ODI of the three-match GrameenPhone ODI series at Mirpur Sher E Bangla National Stadium in Dhaka today (Saturday).
With this win India took an unassailable 2-0 lead in the GrameenPhone ODI series. The third and final ODI of the series will be played on Tuesday, May 15 at Chittagong.
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Indian opener Gambhir smashed second ODI century of his career to propel India to a commanding 284-7 in stipulated 49 overs, after Indian skipper Rahul Dravid won the toss, and opted to bat first. Man of the match Gambhir in his 113 ball 101 struck 11 fine boundaries, and held the Indian innings together for the major part of the innings.
Gambhir received useful support from the last ODIs man of the match Mahendra Singh Dhoni (36 off 54 balls) and skipper Rahul Dravid (42 off 47 deliveries) during his match winnings knock. At one point India were heading towards a total of in excess of 300, but Bangladeshi bowlers did well in the late overs to hold them back. India managed only 68 runs from the last 10 over losing 5 wickets. At the end 284-8 posted by India proved well enough to secure an easy win.
Mohammad Rafiq took 3 wickets for 59 runs and was the most successful bowler for Bangladesh. Left-arm paceman Syed Rasel with his controlled swing bagged 2 wickets for 49 runs.
Chasing a victory target of 285 in 49 overs, Bangladesh lost their way at the very beginning when their dashing opener Tamim Iqbal ran him out scoring only 7 runs. Indian opening bowlers Zaheer Khan and Munaf Patel received the reward of a disciplined bowling effort as Bangladesh slipped to 86-4 in 16.4 overs.
Bangladesh failed to recover from that position and some poor batting in the middle over ruled them out of the match. Under fire skipper Habibul Bashar played a sedate 43 off 88 balls which didn't help Bangladesh's cause as the scoring rate soared to 11 per over. A blitzkrieg 42 off 22 balls by Mashrafe Mortaza could only reduce the margin of defeat as the result of the match was already certain by that time. .
Mashrafe scored 25 runs off Dinesh Mongia's 7th over with four successive sixes to provide some entertainment to the packed crowd who were disappointed by the poor show from the home side. Aftab Ahmed (40 off 41 balls) and Muhfiqur Rahim (35 off 43 balls) were the other notable contributors for Bangladesh.
Indian promising leg spinner Piyush Chawla made an impressive debut and bagged 3 wickets for 37 runs in his spell of 10 overs. Zaheer Khan and Yuvraj Singh picked two wickets each for 32 and 40 runs respectively.
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