Pakistan take Final league match Rajiv Kumar - 1 April 1999 CricInfo report

Pakistan, playing with all their top players, comfortably beat an inexperienced, ``experimental'' Indian team by 7 wickets. Agarkar, Srinath, Kumble, Azharuddin, Mongia, Ramesh, and Kambli did not play today. However this result has no real consequence as both teams have already qualified for the Pepsi Cup final on Sunday.

India won the toss and elected to bat first. Shoaib Akhtar's sensational opening spell shook the Indian innings to its very foundation. He was both lightning quick and very accurate. The fourth over of the match was full of high drama. Bowling from around the wicket, Akhtar let loose a fierce short ball that crashed into the rib cage of Ganguly. The batsman dropped his bat and fell down writhing in pain. Ganguly had to be helped off the field. Two balls latter, Dravid clipped Akhtar off his pads and Afridi, standing at square leg, took a brilliant diving catch inches of the ground. Dravid was out for a duck.

Jadeja and Karim tried hard to push the scoring along but the Pakistani pace attack was too good for them. Countless balls were played at and missed by the batsmen. At the end of his first spell, Akhtar had bowled six overs, given away 8 runs, taken 1 wicket and sent one batsman to the hospital!

After struggling for 51 balls, Karim was caught by Ijaz at backward point. To the suprise of everybody Ganguly came back to bat when the wicket fell. Two overs latter Jadeja played onto his stumps. Khurasiya made a promising start by smashing Azhar to the offside fence. But the talented newcomer was taken to school by Saqlain Mushtaq. The master offspinner bowled a beautiful flighted delivery, enticing the batsman to come down the wicket. The ball went the other way, Khurasiya missed it and was stumped.

Robin Singh and Ganguly steadied the innings but runs were few and far between. At the end of 30 overs, India had made only 98 runs for the loss of 4 wickets. After adding 72 runs along with Singh, Ganguly was caught at deep cover by Afridi. He had made a patient 57 of 89 balls. After that, wickets fell regularly. Newcomers Shewag and Shukla failed. Singh and Kanitkar ran themselves out in the silliest fashion possible. On both occasions the batsmen were guilty of not calling properly.

A slow over rate, problems with the balls, Ganguly's injury and 33 extras ensured that the Indian innings was an amazing four and a half hours long! At end of 50 overs, India had made 196 runs. Pakistan needed to get those runs in 47 overs.

The Pakistan innings began in dramatic fashion. The first over from Venkatesh Prasad to Saeed Anwar was a beauty. He teased Anwar with good length deliveries that pitched on offstump and swung away from the left hander. Anwar played and missed twice before he finally nicked one to the keeper. Pakistan were 0/1! Afridi and Imran Nazir added 16 runs before Nazir got an inside edge that was held very well by Karim. Prasad continued his brilliant spell of swing bowling. Afridi was the next man out when he got a leading edge that was caught by Dravid running in from long off. Debutant R.Shukla bowled a good spell of 10 overs at the other end.

Ijaz Ahmed and Inzamam built up a very good partnership. They made a cautious start, carefully planning their innings. They did not take any risks with the medium paced bowlers. Prasad completed his outstanding first spell of eight overs for 15 runs and 3 wickets.

Both these experienced batsmen nudged the ball into the gaps and took easy singles. Earth shattering noises from airforce jets not distract the batsmen. Slowly as their confidence grew, Ijaz and Inzamam started playing their shots. The Indian spinners were not at all impressive. Shewag and Kanitkar bowled the wrong line, giving away easy singles down the leg side. The last chance of breaking this partnership was lost when Pandey dropped Inzamam at deep square leg of the bowling of Prasad. That was in the 36th over. As though the dropped catch was some kind of signal in the very next over the Pakistani batsmen started hitting the bowling out of the stadium. Both Ijaz and Inzamam hit boundaries at will and Pakistan reached the required target in the 42nd over. Pakistan had won by 7 wickets.

For his responsible knock of 89 runs of 130 balls, Ijaz was made the man of the match. The final of the Pepsi Cup will be played on Sunday, the 4th of April at Bangalore at 2pm IST (8:30 GMT).