A stunning Deepak Chahar almost sealed his place in the Indian cricket team for Twenty 20 cricket. His astonishing spell won the series for India 2-1 against Bangladesh in Nagpur.
Kl Rahul makes a point
Bangladesh winning the toss elected to field first. They were immediately on the run as they took both the openers within the 6th over of Indian innings. What bothered again was Shikhar Dhawan’s T20 stint. Rohit Sharma’s early dismissal on the night gave him the perfect scenario to work on.
Dhawan and KL Rahul both were keen making statements to secure their T20I spots in the team. Dhawan did a decent 19 off 16 with four fours whereas KL Rahul kept his fest on with 52 off 35. He grabbed this chance better especially when compared to Dhawan’s overall T20I performance this year so far.
Shreyas Iyer- India’s No. 4
Shreyas Iyer is probably the answer to the much-anticipated number four batting position in the Indian line-up. When Iyer walked in, India was 35/2 in the sixth over. Kl Rahul was already there in an attacking mood. Iyer started slowly and took the time to reach 8 of 11.
The shift came in the 11th over against Aminul Islam when Iyer struck the bowler for a six and a four. Then the runs started coming and even after the dismissal of Rahul Iyer was unstoppable. Â In the 15th over he went for three consecutive sixes and completed his maiden half-century in the format off 27 balls. He eventually ended with a 33-ball 62.
Manish Pandey supported well in the end with a 13-ball 22*. But Rishabh Pant failed once again with the bat and could add just six runs to the final total of 174/5.
Indian bowlers thump Bangladesh
While bowling Indian bowlers were on money from the beginning. Bangladesh started to lose wickets from the beginning. Deepak Chahar gave the first breakthrough by sending Liton Das and Soumya Sarkar in the 2.4 and 2.5 over. Yes, he did miss a chance of registering a hat-trick here.
When Bangladesh was struggling with 12/2, Mohammad Mithun and Mohammad Naim stitched together a partnership of 98 runs that was once again broken by Chahar. The bowler picked up Mithun in the 13th over and Bangladesh was once again on the back foot.
Shivam Dubey took the ball in the next over and the very first ball saw him picking up Mushfiqur Rahim for a golden duck. At that point, Chahar’s bowling analysis of the first two overs read 2-0-3-3. Naim was standing strong at the end with the mission of accomplishing the job. But Dubey was there to give the most important blow. The 16th over saw him scalping Naim (81) and Afif Hossain in back to back deliveries. Yes, even Dubey was on a hat-trick at a certain point.
Yuzvendra Chahal meanwhile took the wicket of Mahmuddulah in the 17th over and Bangladesh were left with the lower order only to chase down the target. Deepak Chahar returned to deliver his last spell in the 18th over. He dismissed Shafiul Islam off the last ball in the 18th over.
This dismissal was almost an action replay of his third wicket as once again batsman’s timing went wrong and KL Rahul grabbed the catch. Chahar then delivered the final over of the match when it was just a matter of time for India to seal the match and series. Chahar removed  Mustafizur Rahman and Aminul Islam in the first two consecutive deliveries in the final over and finally completed his hat-trick.
Chahar, the record man
Deepak Chahar thus became the first Indian bowler in Men’s T20I to register a hat-trick in the shortest format of the game. Left-arm spinner Ekta Bisht had accomplished this for India in 2012 against Sri Lanka when she had claimed 3/16.
Finally, he registered the best bowling figure ever in a Men’s Twenty 20 International match. His 3.2-0-7-6 surpassed the previous best in this format recorded by Ajantha Mendis, who had picked six wickets by conceding only eight runs against Zimbabwe in 2012. In the overall list, Mas Elysa took six for three for Malaysia Women against China.
The important part of Chahar’s bowling was his bowling improved with the older and wetter ball. Interestingly, out of 10 wickets of Bangladesh innings, India took eight of them in successive deliveries.
Brief scores
India 174 for 5 (Iyer 62, Rahul 52, Sarkar 2-29, Shafiul 2-32) beat Bangladesh 144 (Naim 81, Chahar 6-7, Dube 3-30) by 30 runs