Dhaka, Jan. 27: Bangladesh imploded in spectacular fashion to hand India victory by 10 wickets on the fourth morning of the second Test here on Wednesday, Zaheer Khan leading the Indians home with career-best figures that included the last four wickets off just seven deliveries at the Sher-e-Bangla Stadium.
Adjudged Man of the Series for his 15 wickets haul — including best innings figures of 7/87 on the day and match figures of 10/149 — Zaheer was virtually unplayable on a pitch that had almost nothing for the bowlers. He bent his back to extract bounce and movement even as his colleagues struggled from the other end and once he had found his range he was devastating.
Bangladesh were bowled out for 312, two balls into the post-lunch session and openers Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir did not even get on the scoreboard in getting the winning runs, which came off byes off Shakib Al Hasan’s second delivery.
There were, however, no hints of the collapse that would ensue as the Tigers set off this morning. The Indians were generous to a fault, spilling catches, conceding overthrows and generally looking extremely untidy on the field.
That phase lasted till the 20th over of the day when Harbhajan Singh made the breakthrough with the wicket of night-watchman Shahadat Hossain. And in a bizarre sequence thereafter, Bangladesh fell apart to slide from 290/4 to 312 all out, the last seven wickets going for just 22 runs between the 80th and 91st overs.
India now return home for a far stiffer test at South Africa’s hands, from February 6 at Nagpur, and the management will have its hands full in coping with the rash of injuries that erupted here.
If key batsmen like Rahul Dravid and Venkatasai Laxman do not recover in time from the setbacks here, Team India will be sorely tested against the Proteas, who were the last visiting team to beat the hosts in quite some time, back in early 2008 at Ahmedabad.
For the moment though, Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Gary Kirsten will look back on a job well done as they wrapped up the series 2-0. Given the way Bangladesh batted on the third day here, it looked as though they would stretch India considerably. Even on the fourth morning there was little to suggest the drama that would follow in the second hour after Ashraful and Shahadat had made a brisk start, resuming at 228/3.
India contributed to the proceedings. Amit Mishra made a horrendous hash of a skier from Shahadat off Harbhajan. Runs also came from overthrows and by and large, the Indians looked anything but focussed.
All that changed within minutes of Harbhajan making the breakthrough. Shahadat and Ashraful put on 68 for the fourth wicket with the former hitting his way to a 74-ball 40 (4x4, 1x6) when he took the off-spinner on once too often. This time Mishra made no mistake at long-on.
It was almost as if a trigger had been pulled. Ashraful had seen off 60 deliveries on the day when he went back but was beaten by a Pragyan Ojha delivery that curled away to find an edge through to Dhoni’s gloves.
The inexplicable implosion then picked up pace. Shakib walloped a six off Ojha and then bent down to take an almighty swipe at the bowler but only found Gautam Gambhir stationed at square leg in the way. At 301/6 all the gains of the third day had been squandered, setting the stage for the Zaheer scythe.
The left-arm quick — who had picked up the first three wickets of the innings — saw Raqibul Hasan pick completely the wrong ball to leave. Zaheer came around the wicket and saw the batsman shouldering arms to a ball that dipped in to make a mess of his wickets.
Two balls later, first innings hero Mahmudullah was sucked into an attempted prod and Murali Vijay proved an extremely competent replacement for Dravid in the slips, diving low and to his left to scoop up the chance.
Bangladesh were now on the run and Shafiul gave Zaheer a hat-trick opportunity by completely misreading the line of the ball before last man Rubel Hossain kept the rampaging bowler out to avert the feat.
Mushfiqur Rahim made sure India would need to bat again when he square cut Harbhajan to negate the visitors’ 311-run lead as lunch was taken.
They only needed two deliveries in the second session to wrap things up when Zaheer castled Rubel.
RAHUL BANERJI
