Durban: India survived an edge-of-the-seat thriller to beat Pakistan via Bowl Out and reach the Super Eights stage of the Twenty20 cricket World Cup on Friday night.
After the crucial Group D match ended in a tie, both the teams headed for Bowl Out and India had the last laugh there.
In Bowl Out, Virender Sehwag, Harbhajan Singh and Robin Uthappa were spot on for India while none of the Pakistanis, Yasir Arafat, Umar Gul and Shahid Afridi, could hit the stumps.
After restricting India to 141 for 9, Misbah-ul Haq (53, 35b, 7x4, 1x6) almost took Pakistan to a win with but was the last man to be out in the final delivery of the innings, which leading to a tie.
Despite the defeat, Pakistan too made it to the next stage, thanks to their win against Scotland.
Earlier, Mohammad Asif brought the Indians to their knees with a brilliant opening spell, taking four for 18 to restrict them to 141 for nine, which earned him the Man of the Match award.
Reduced to 36 for four in the seventh over, India were then pulled out of the woods by a sizzling half century by Robin Uthappa, who made a 39-ball 50 with four fours and two sixes and Mahendra Singh Dhoni, who scored 33 off 31 balls with three fours and a six.
Asif (4/18), Shahid Afridi (2/37) and Sohail Tanvir (1/18) shared the spoils for Pakistan.
Defending a total that hardly left any margin for error, RP Singh made an early inroad when he castled Imran Nazir(7).
Salman Butt (16), Kamran Akmal (15) and Younis Khan (2) returned in quick successions as Pakistan woke up to harsh reality with four of their top batsmen back in the pavilion with the score reading just 47.
They kept losing wickets at regular intervals and Harbhajan Singh raised the hopes of an Indian win by removing the dangerous Shahid Afridi for just seven.
In the end, Misbah-ul Haq almost did it for his side but an alert Yuvraj returned him run out to leave the match tied.
Earlier, after Shoaib Malik inserted India on a pitch of variable bounce and pace, Asif exploited the conditions with his pace and seam making life difficult for the Indian batsmen.
The tall and lanky pacer gave Pakistan a great start picking up four wickets in four overs dismissing Gautam Gambhir (0), Virender Sehwag (5), Yuvraj Singh (1) and Dinesh Kaarthick (11).
Gambhir was a third ball casualty when Asif stretched out his right hand to pluck a hot return catch while Sehwag went for a big drive and edged him on to his stumps.
Yuvraj got a leading edge as he tried to turn one on the on-side for Shoaib Malik to take an easy skier at mid-off.
Kaarthick smashed Asif over his head and over point for two blazing fours in the third over but the bowler got his revenge in his final over. He brought one in sharply, and as Karthik tried to keep it down, the ball hit his elbow and crashed onto his stumps.
Uthappa, however, was batting well at one end having taken a four each off Asif and Gul. And he turned it on when he was joined by Dhoni.
Uthappa hit two glorious sixes off Yaseer Arafat's second over as India collected 17 runs in the 10th over of their innings. Uthappa hit him over long-off and into the stands as mid-wicket.
Rains stopped play for seven minutes but it made little difference to Uthappa's mood as he smashed Afridi for two fours in the 12th over, reaching his 50 off just 38 balls in which he hit four fours and two sixes.
However, play stopped again for less than a minute and the batsmen had to return after having they were half way to the pavilion after 12 overs. On resumption, Uthappa was caught at the wicket to the first ball he faced from left-arm pacer Sohail Tanver as he tried to steer one and got a leading edge.
Irfan Pathan then hit two big sixes off Afridi in the 16th over before being bowled off the next one.
Dhoni got going in the 17th over, driving Arafat to long-on fence and pulling him over fine leg for maximum. And then rains forced a third stoppage after 17 overs with India on 123 for six.
Ajit Agarkar threw his bat around to pick up two fours off Gul in the penultimate over before Dhoni was caught in the deep in the final over bowled by Arafat.
With this hard-earned win, India maintained the record of never losing in any cricket World Cup to their arch-rivals.
