IN THE opening match of the ICC World Cup 2011 India defeated co-hosts Bangladesh in style. All this action took place at Mirpur’s Sher- e-Bangla National Stadium on Saturday. While hosts Bangladesh wanted to win the match, India wanted to avenge their defeat in the 2007 World Cup, where they were defeated quite badly.
The early exit of Sachin Tendulkar in the match came as a blow for the team, which batted first. However,swashbuckling Indian opener, Virender Sehwag took the Bangladeshi bowlers to the cleaners and scored his 14th ODI century, off just 94 balls. His next 50 runs came off just 30 balls. Together with his teammate Virat Kohli, who completed his ton in just 83 balls, Sehwag was able to script a magnificent win for India.
On the bowling side too, there were both pros and cons. Medium pacer Munaf Patel took four wickets by giving away just 48 runs in 10 overs but pacer Sreesanth was wayward giving away 53 runs in just five overs. With Munaf’s bowling, India was taken a step closer towards a predictable yet patchy victory.
It was also a day of setting up of new records. Virender Sehwag’s 175 runs became the highest individual score for the opening match of the World Cup, beating New Zealand legend Glenn Turner’s record of 171 in 1975 opener. India’s 370 mark also became the highest score for the opening match of World Cup beating England’s 334 in the 1975 edition. Sehwag’s score of 175 is also his personal highest breaking his earlier record of 146.
He also equaled Kapil Dev’s knock of 175 not out in 1983 World Cup match against Zimbabwe. This 32 year old, Indian opener smashed 14 boundaries and hammered five sixes in his knock of 175 runs. Though he was successful in breaking many records but couldn’t break record of highest score by an Indian by Saurav Ganguly which is 183 runs and also the highest ever World Cup score of 188 by Gary Kirsten- now the Indian coach.
His teammate Virat Kohli too scored his fifth one day ton and became a part of the group of cricketers, who have scored a hundred on the World Cup debut. At a fast rate of 8.4 runs per over, he and his partner Sehwag yielded 203 runs for the third wicket partnership. The partnership was also the fifth double century partnership for India in the World Cup with Sehwag featuring in all of them.
On the other hand, Bangladesh batsman also challeneged India belligerently. By the end of the first power play they were at a score of 68 runs for the loss of one wicket, with the first 50 runs coming off just less than five overs. Imrul Kayes scored 34 runs out off 29 balls. Captain Shakib-Al-Hassan scored a magnificent 55 runs off just 50 balls and the opener, Tamim Iqbal scored 70 runs out off 86 balls.
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