Rahane leaves England in trouble

Ajinkya Rahane
12 April 2012

England must chase 187 for eight after Ajinkya Rahane served notice again of his potential as a rising star for India.

Rahane (54) added a maiden one-day international half-century, at only his second attempt, to a 50 on Twenty20 debut a week ago as India put a challenging total on the board in this second NatWest Series match - reduced to 23 overs per side under lights after rain delayed the start until 7pm.

Graeme Swann (three for 33) did his best to put the brakes on the scoring rate.

But Rahane, his opening partner Parthiv Patel and Rahul Dravid put India in a promising position - after being asked to bat first - and then Suresh Raina did the rest with 40 from only 19 deliveries.

James Anderson was effective with the new ball. It was he who saw off Patel, after the left-hander had got India off to a flying start with a rush of three boundaries and two leg-side sixes - scoring 28 of the first 30 runs as Tim Bresnan (three for 43) tried unsuccessfully to discomfort him with the short ball.

Patel got a faint edge behind. But with Stuart Broad also banging the ball in short, Rahane soon cashed in too - smashing a six many rows into the crowd at deep backward-square.

He and Dravid gave India the perfect platform in a stand of 79 from 11 overs, until the latter smeared one off Swann to straight midwicket where Anderson juggled but held on to a low catch.

Virat Kohli fell in the cause, picking out long-on off Swann, only to return soon afterwards as Rahane's runner.

The latter had reached his 50, with five fours and that six, from 40 balls - before a leg injury appeared to compromise his movement, and he soon chipped a drive back at Swann to become the off-spinner's final victim.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni's 'helicopter' shot misfired, for a catch at long-on off the returning Bresnan but Raina punished Jade Dernbach with some huge hits - and despite a fine final over from Bresnan and some outstanding outfield catching from England, Ian Bell in particular, India had an overdue and better-than-even chance of a first victory over their hosts this summer.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in