Dhoni misses a hundred but adds 101 with R. P. Singh

KINGSTON - A painstaking 95 from skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni and his defiant 101-run ninth-wicket partnership with Rudra Pratap Singh helped pull India out of a hole and reach a decent 188 after being 82 for eight in the second one-day international against the West Indies here at Sabina Park Sunday.

On a pitch which produced 658 runs in the first one dayer between the two teams barely 48 hours ago, the West Indies new ball bowlers looked a lot more potent with recalled Ravi Rampaul (four for 37) seaming disconcertingly, Jerome Taylor (3 for 35) swinging at a lively pace and Dwayne Bravo (3 for 26) hitting the deck to make the ball bounce sharply. They exploited the moisture in the glossy pitch and exposed the technical ineptitude of the batsmen.

The three bowlers almost ran through the innings which never looked like getting even to cross the 100-run-mark when the eighth wicket fell in the 22nd over, save for a brief while when Yuvraj (35, 33 balls, 5×4, 1×6) and Dhoni (95, 130b, 2×4, 2×6) were together to add 47 runs after the first three batsmen fell for nothing.

In fact, all the six mainline batsmen were consumed behind the stumps, either caught by wicketkeeper Denesh Ramdin or at slip as the hopped and tentatively prodded at short-pitched deliveries.

Dinesh Karthik’s dismissal was an exception as the opener received a peach of a delivery which he could not help nicking. But both Gautam Gambhir and Rohit Sharma played reckless strokes to get out.

Only Yuvraj Singh, who scored a match-winning century in the first ODI, looked like getting the measure of the attack as he struck 35 off 33 balls but once he got out the innings seemed like collapsing till R.P. Singh joined Dhoni to stem the rot.

Yuvraj was caught behind and so was the other left-hander Ravindra Jadeja. Yusuf Pathan could only guide a short-pitched ball to slip Chris Gayle. When Harbhajan and Praveen Kumar fell, the Indians could not use even half the overs.

Ramdin pouched five catches and easily should have had one more if he had not parried the ball into the hands of slip Runako Morton. Rampaul, who in the closing stages dropped Dhoni on the log-off boundary and propelled the ball on to the boundary picket for six, finished with his best ODI figures.

But Dhoni, playing a real captain’s innings, inspired R.P. Singh (23, 75b, 1×4, 1×6) to stay with him and the two gave their side something to bowl at and save them from an embarrassing collapse. He batted purposefully, shielding R.P. Singh to start with and then allowed him to gain in confidence.

Apart from Dhoni, the other nine batsmen collectively faced ten deliveries more than the 75 played by R. P. Singh. So much so, the left-arm medium-pacer struck a six in the slog overs.

Dhoni richly deserved a century, more so as he had been struggling to play a big knock in recent times. Eventually, he went in the penultimate over as he tried to make room to have a go at Taylor who deceived him to hit the stumps with a slower delivery.