Mumbai: Parimatch Sports, a high-quality sportswear brand inspired by the world’s top athletes, has released an infographic with a brief retrospective of the Indo-Pak cricket rivalry, honoring India’s victory on the cricketing field on February 23 and national team’s winning spirit.
India and Pakistan share a storied rivalry across various sports but cricket holds the nerves of fans on both sides of the border like no other game. Let’s have a look at the five matches between India and Pakistan in ICC Champions Trophy history:
#1 Pakistan defeats India by 3 wickets, CT 2004
Batting first in the first meeting between India and Pakistan at the Champions Trophy, India found themselves in a tricky spot at 106/6 with most of their recognized batters back in the hut.
Rahul Dravid and Ajit Agarkar stitched together a crucial partnership to help India reach the 200-run mark and gain a psychological advantage before they went out on the field to defend the target.
Saurav Ganguly’s men bowled their hearts out as Irfan Pathan was breathing fire and dismissed the entire top-order single-handedly. But, Mohammad Yousuf’s unbeaten innings of 81 runs took the Shaheens across the line with four balls to spare.
#2 Pakistan defeats India by 54 runs, CT 2009
In the 2009 ICC Champions Trophy, the 206-run partnership between Shoaib Malik and Yousuf defined the result of the match. Malik scored a century while Yousuf’s innings of 87 runs helped Pakistan post a total of 302 runs on the board.
Ashish Nehra was India’s most successful bowler as India’s spinners struggled on the seam-friendly surface in Centurion. In reply, Gautam Gambhir and Dravid scored half-centuries but both batters got run out and the middle-order deflated under pressure from the spinners as Pakistan defeated India yet again in the Champions Trophy.
#3 India defeats Pakistan by 8 wickets, CT 2013
India finally got their first win in the Champions Trophy against Pakistan in 2013 as Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Ashwin, Ishant Sharma, and Jadeja picked two wickets each as Asad Shafique top-scored for Pakistan who ended up with 165 runs on the board.
Rohit Sharma and Shikhar Dhawan opened the innings and it was a start-stop affair as the rain kept interrupting the run chase. Virat Kohli and Dinesh Karthik remained unbeaten as India wrapped the run-chase on D/L Method with 8 wickets to spare
#4 India defeats Pakistan by 124 runs, CT 2017
Rain interrupting India-Pakistan matches in the Champions Trophy is an age-long tradition that continued in the 2017 edition at Birmingham but it didn’t dampen the Indian spirits as Rohit, Dhawan, Yuvraj Singh, and Kohli scored half-centuries to help India post 319 runs on the board.
In response, Sarfaraz Ahmed’s men folded like a pack of cards with Umesh Yadav taking 3 wickets while Jadeja and Pandya picked two wickets each. Azhar Ali did score a half-century in the crucial group match but lack of support from the other end meant that his efforts went in vain.
The Men in Green did sneak into the semi-finals courtesy of their wins against South Africa and Sri Lanka en route to winning the trophy for the first time in Champions Trophy history.
#5 Pakistan defeats India by 180 runs, CT 2017 Final
After winning the toss, chase-master Kohli chose to field first which proved to be decisive as Fakhar Zaman’s century followed by a half-century from Mohammad Hafeez allowed the Men in Green to post a total of 338 runs at The Oval in London.
While Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Hardik Pandya bowled economically, no other bowler was successful in containing runs as India conceded 232 runs in 30 overs spread between Jasprit Bumrah, Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, and Kedar Jadhav.
While chasing the huge target, Mohammad Amir bowled a dream spell of 3/16 in 6 overs dismissing Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan, and Virat Kohli and thus breaking India’s back in the run-chase.
Soon, Yuvraj Singh, Jadhav, and MS Dhoni were also back in the hut leaving Hardik and Jadeja with a huge task at hand. Pandya broke free and scored 76 runs off 43 balls before a miscommunication with Jadeja ended his innings and thus India’s chances of defending their title.