By Qaiser Mohammad Ali, IANS
Bangalore : India clinched their first home Test series against Pakistan in 27 years Wednesday as the third and final match here ended in a draw when poor light halted play.
India, by virtue of their win in the first Test in Delhi, clinched the series 1-0. It was captain Anil Kumble’s first series as Test captain and he crowned it with the winner’s trophy at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium. The second Test in Kolkata ended in a draw.
The match ended amidst high drama as someone by mistake switched on the floodlights at the Stadium. The mistake was on part of someone, who was obviously not familiar with the playing conditions of the three-Test series. That led to the third umpire G.A. Pratapkumar rushing down from his room on third storey of the clubhouse to switch off the lights.
“How can they switch on the lights? How can they switch on the lights?” he kept repeating as he hurried ran down the staircase.
Pakistan were 162 for seven and struggling to save the match while chasing 374 for a win, when the ground umpires Simon Taufel of Australia and Rudi Koertzen of South Africa stopped play. Mohammed Yousuf (10) and Mohammed Sami (4) were at the crease when play was stopped, with 12 of the 48 overs remaining. Pakistan scored 537 in their first innings in reply to India’s 626 and 284 for six wickets declared.
After about 10 minutes the lights were finally switched off. But the match could not be started, as the natural light did not get better.
India last won a series over Pakistan in India was in 1979-80, when Asif Iqbal’s team lost 0-2 to Sunil Gavaskar-led India in the six-match series.
Set to score at 7.79 per over, Pakistan never looked like chasing the target. But when Pakistan lost two consecutive wickets in a single Kumble over, the 32nd of the innings, there was renewed excitement in the air and in the stands.
Kumble missed the hat-trick but went on to take his 34th five-wicket haul as Pakistan crumbled. As the leg-spinner took the first five wickets, many people could not help remembering his 10-wickets-in-an-innings haul against the same opposition in Delhi in 1999.
But Yuvraj Singh, bowling from the pavilion end, took the next two wickets to get his best bowling figures and the fall of wickets added to the excitement for the crowd.
Earlier, Sourav Ganguly notched a fine 91 (187 minutes, 134 balls, 12x4s, 1×6) and Dinesh Karthik finally scored some runs in the series (52, 94 minutes, 67 balls, 8x4s, 1×6) before Kumble declared the innings in the post-lunch session. Karthik also hit Kaneria for 14 runs in one over, including two boundaries and a six, in which stand-in Younis Khan dropped him at silly point at 10.
The declaration came too late in the day to virtually kill all the interest in the match.
India started the day at 131 for two, with Rahul Dravid batting on 35 and Ganguly on 63. Dravid became the first victim of the day as leg-spinner Danish Kaneria deceived him with a well-disguised googly at the score of 42, which came in 212 minutes off 121 balls with five fours.
Ganguly and Dravid raised 152 for the third wicket off 235 balls. Ganguly was in great touch and looked to set score his second century of the match.
However, the left-hander’s effort to become the seventh batsman to score a double and single century in a Test did not bear fruit as pacer Mohammed Sami terminated his innings. Ganguly’s square cut went straight into the hands of Faisal Iqbal at gully.
But the former captain did have the satisfaction of completing 1,000 runs in the year during the knock.
Yuvraj, who has been in sublime form and scored a century in the first innings, failed as he was handed a wrong decision from the umpire in his first Test since June last year. The Sami delivery went past the left-hander’s bat but television replays showed that the ball had not touched the willow on way to wicketkeeper Kamran Akmal.
V.V.S. Laxman was hit on the elbow as he duck into a short-pitched ball from Shoaib Akhtar. The batsman returned to the dressing room.
SCOREBOARD
Day 5, Third Test, India vs. Pakistan, M. Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bangalore
India (1st innings): 626
Pakistan (1st innings): 537
India (2nd innings, overnight 131/2):
Wasim Jaffer lbw b Arafat 18
Gautam Gambhir b Shoaib Akhtar 3
Rahul Dravid lbw b Kaneria 42
Sourav Ganguly c Iqbal b Sami 91
V.V.S. Laxman retired hurt 14
Yuvraj Singh c Akmal b Sami 2
Dinesh Karthik c Akmal b Arafat 52
Irfan Pathan not out 21
Extras: (byes 9, leg byes 24, wide 1, no balls 7) 41
Total: (for 6 wickets declared in 76.3 overs) 284
Fall of wickets: 1-17 (Gambhir, 6.4 overs), 2-26 (Jaffer, 12.5), 3-178 (Dravid, 51.4), 4-178 (Ganguly, 52.1), 5-184 (Yuvraj, 54.6), 5-225* (Laxman, retired hurt, 62.3), 6-284 (Karthik, 76.3)
Bowling:
Shoaib Akhtar 17 6 43 1
Mohammad Sami 20 2 63 2 (2nb, 1w)
Yasir Arafat 13.3 3 49 2 (1nb)
Danish Kaneria 26 2 96 1
Pakistan (2nd innings):
Salman Butt c Karthik b Kumble 8
Yasir Hameed b Kumble 39
Younis Khan c & b Kumble 0
Faisal Iqbal c Sharma b Kumble 51
Misbah-ul-Haq b Yuvraj 37
Kamran Akmal b Kumble 0
Mohammad Yousuf not out 10
Yasir Arafat b Yuvraj 0
Mohammed Sami not out 4
Extras: (b 12, lb 1) 13
Total: (for seven wickets in 36 overs) 162
Fall of wickets: 1-44 (Hameed, 13.3 overs), 2-44 (Younis, 13.6), 3-73 (Salman, 21.1), 4-144 (Iqbal, 31.4), 5-144 (Akmal, 31.5), 6-148 (Misbah, 32.5), 7-154 (Arafat, 34.2)
Result: Draw
Series: India win 1-0
Man of the Match: Sourav Ganguly
Man of the Series: Sourav Ganguly
Umpires: Simon Taufel (Australia) and Rudi Koertzen (South Africa)
Third umpire: G.A. Pratapkumar (India)
Fourth umpire: Suhas Phadkar (India)
Match referee: Ranjan Madugalle (Sri Lanka)