Related Links : Pakistan’s Tour of India : Scorecard
India have taken the crucial 2-1 lead with a well earned 46-run victory in the third ODI at Kanpur. Yuvraj Singh made most of a dropped catch to punish Pakistan with a top innings that got India to a formidable total on a wicket that favoured spinners. Pakistan chasing a target of 295 were never really in the hunt despite Salman Butt staying a long time in the crease scoring a hundred.
Pakistan won a good toss to put India to bat first with the initial conditions helping the seam bowlers. India did the basics right, getting off to a good start with the old pair of Tendulkar and Ganguly getting an opening stand of 68. Both couldn’t kick onto make bigger scores though and both were dismissed by the left arm pacer – Sohail Tanvir. Tendulkar made 29 in 27 with 5 fours while Ganguly, the more dominating of the two today got 39 from 46 with 4 fours and a six.
The Pakistani bowlers could bring the run rate down as the next pair of Gambhir and Yuvraj tried to take their time to settle down to the slow paced track. Abdur Rehman showed the true nature of the pitch with a delivery that turned back sharply and bounced to disturb Gambhir’s stumps in the 28th over. Gambhir made 25 in 49 balls out of a partnership of 47 with Yuvraj. Spin was just about to dominate and India would have been in further trouble but for a sitter dropped at short mid wicket by Salman Butt which provided a big life for Yuvraj Singh. The Indians cashed heavily on that lapse and Yuvraj with Dhoni suddenly shifted gears with their big hitting. Eventually India ended with a huge score that wouldn’t have been possible if Pakistan had quality spinners to utilize the wicket properly. Yuvraj recovered to his own self after a struggling start to get 77 from 95 balls with 4 fours and three sixes. Captain MS Dhoni got 49 in 52 with 4 fours and 2 sixes to involve himself in the 100-run stand for the fourth wicket. Towards the end, India got useful cameos from Uthappa (19 from 17), Pathan (17* from 7 with 2 sixes) and Harbhajan (10*) to end at 294 for 6. Shoaib Akhtar with 10-1-40-1 and Sohail Tanvir with 10-1-26-2 were the only performers with the ball.
Pakistan in their chase promoted Shahid Afridi to open with Salman Butt. A casual swing of the bat from Afridi (12 from 7) saw his stump uprooted to a straight delivery from Irfan Pathan to give the early lift to the fielding side in the 4th over. However, Younis Khan turned the heat on the opposition with his positive strokeplay with Salman Butt too finding his touch. The Indians could comeback though with Younis Khan misjudging an incoming delivery from RP Singh to cut short his innings to just 21. Pak at this stage were going strongly with already 72 runs coming in the first nine overs. After that wicket, the Indians contained the scoring rate and the pressure started to tell through a run out of Mohammad Yousuf which was effected by Yuvraj Singh in the 18th over. Pak were now 104 for 3 and with spin at both ends in Harbhajan and Kartik, the scoring rate got lowered gradually. In the 28th over, Yuvraj Singh came up with a wicket that of Shoaib Malik to have the score at 134 for 4.
Salman Butt was standing firm at one end while all the action was happening at the other end. He just found a partnership going with Misbah-ul-Haq but the required run rate was always too high and Salman Butt really didn’t play any big lofted shots. In the 42nd over, Murali Kartik provided a telling blow by cleaning up Misbah-ul-Haq (38 from 47) and then RP Singh got rid of Kamran Akmal cheaply. It was now a Herculean task left for the young Salman Butt and all he could do was crack up his fourth ODI hundred with all the four coming against India! Butt made 129 from 142 balls with 17 fours before been trapped lbw by Harbhajan Singh. Pakistan were bowled out in the 48th over for 248. The two Indian spinners did what was expected off them on a wearing wicket but it was Zaheer Khan who did a difficult job of pulling the run rate down during the powerplays when Pak were doing well. In total contrast to his sorry performance in the 2nd ODI, Zaheer came up with inspiring figures of 7.2-2-25-1. The Man of the Match was Yuvraj Singh who even bowled well giving away just 18 in his 5 overs along with two run outs to add up to his 77.