Kohli century pushes Pakistan towards the exit

In the biggest match of the year, with his mortality showing more than it ever used to, Virat Kohli showed he's still got it, that maybe, just maybe, the little he's lost wasn't going to define him. He ticked off 14,000 runs in ODI cricket, brought up his 51st ODI century, set up India for a semi-final spot and essentially crossed out Pakistan from the 2025 Champions Trophy. The holders and the hosts need other results to go their way to stay alive in their own tournament now.

India went into the game as favourites. They proved worthy of that seeding by limiting Pakistan to 241, Hardik Pandya putting in the kind of performance that should make him illegal. An allrounder capable of dismissing the opposition's best batter, and then coming back to take down their top-scorer, isn't just a name on the sheet. He is the secret sauce.

And Kuldeep Yadav was the spice. His left-arm wristspin is so rare and he made it rarer by finding a way to be quick through the air without compromising on turn or accuracy. So that means unless batters pick him out of the hand, they are always going to be guessing. Three Pakistan batters guessed wrong. All three were death-overs wickets. Pakistan were setting up to explode at the death. Kuldeep just wouldn't let them. The injury hasn't affected his menace.

Pakistan were able to produce moments. Shaheen Afridi sending down a 143kph inswinging yorker to shatter Rohit Sharma's stumps. Abrar Ahmed conjuring a carrom ball from hell to get rid of a rampaging Shubman Gill. But when it came to capitalising on them, they just couldn't. The end result was a world champion side that was renowned for pulling games out of the fire now seems to do the first part right - they definitely got into trouble in Dubai - but the other part, the important part is going so very wrong. Pakistan were 151 for 2 before they were bowled out for 241 with the most inexperienced member of the India side dictating terms, Harshit Rana and his slower balls were just impossible to hit.

A game in an ICC event, a rivalry with history bursting out of it, eventually became so one-sided that its last few moments were dominated by an individual pursuit. Axar Patel turned down an easy two so that Kohli could pursue his hundred. The crowd in Dubai loved that. There were 12 runs to get for India's victory and 12 runs to get for their hero's century and they chanted his name over and over. Pakistan were nowhere to be found. Ever since a collapse of 3 for 11 in 19 balls, this game turned pear shaped for them.

It really is a walk in the park. No more question marks.

Runs are starting to flow quite freely. Just look at this set of four between the 29th and the 32nd.

Both Kohli are Iyer are starting to play their shots now. They aren't afraid of what would happen if one of their risks don't come off because a) they have batting depth and b) this chase is almost done.

A lash over cover point off Naseem Shah's pace gets him there. He's got a target in front of him. He's in his happy place. And as a sign of what it means - this game and these runs at this time - he raises his a few times. There's even this one moment where he does the Tendulkar raise of the bat, where he points it out horizontally, the face almost pointed down, to celebrate fifty.

Dinesh Karthik on commentary made an excellent observation about Shreyas Iyer's new batting set up. He now waits for fast bowlers with his hands up high and swinging the bat up and down. To me, it's a trick a little like a batter's trigger movement. It sets them in motion. It stops them from being stuck on the crease. It gees them up to play the ball.

In the same way, that bat-wavy thing Iyer does as he waits for the quick bowler might just set him up for the pull shot. He's just played one to a 143 kph Haris Rauf delivery and made such sweet connection that it went well in front of square. In front of midwicket too.

It's clear he's expecting the short ball and his hands - up high and generating momentum - are putting him in position and attack it. If there's room, he's going for the shot. If there isn't, he's ducking underneath. He's also made sure he isn't caught off guard by the fuller ball. Impressive work, both by him and by his coaches.

In the last ball of the 21st over, after completing a quick single, Virat Kohli stops the throw coming in with his hand. Strictly speaking, that's obstructing the field. India took out Inzamam-ul-Haq that way in an ODI once. Nobody appealed. Maybe because he had made his ground. And then apologised for his brainfade.

It's another jaffa!

Gill CANNOT believe it.

He hears the rattle of his stumps behind him and his mouth opens, stunned.

He looks back, as if needing visual confirmation for that tremor that went down his spine.

How did that spin so far?

How did that spin so fast?

A carrom ball from hell.

Drifting in to pitch on leg stump, maybe even outside, which is why Gill is closing the face of his bat, looking to flick to midwicket. India are also choosing to play Abrar off the back foot and its usually a pain when batters do that. As a spinner, you feel all your good work goes down the drain because once the ball pitches it loses pace and with the time the batter has, having gone deep in his crease, he can just knock you around. Abrar doesn't let that happen. The turn he gets is sharp. It's quick. It's deadly.

Game on. Pakistan bring back their quickest bowler Haris Rauf to do battle with Shreyas Iyer. Good move. Iyer has gotten better facing fast bowling but his strength is dismantling spin bowling. India did the same thing when Rizwan was at the crease and that worked a treat.

An on the up cover drive gets him there. His first boundary of the innings and Dubai is rocking.

He loves pace on the ball. And that makes him theatre. Lara, Sachin, Inzy, Viv. They all stared down fast bowlers. Their biggest nemesis were fast bowlers. And it was hair-raising watching them take them all down. And even now, with some of his powers waning, Kohli is good enough to never ever be rushed. Rauf is bowling 145 kph. But every moment is precise. Every connection is sweet. He's prowling out there on the outfield.

Against Abrar Ahmed's spin though, he is far more reluctant to come forward. Even when the ball is full. The shifting of his body weight is slower. There is more uncertainty in his mind. Spin is asking more questions than pace.

Meanwhile, Gill is asking the physio to come out and check his left knee. Uh-oh.

Haris Rauf comes on and creates chances straight away. He hits the deck and it comes on slower than Kohli expects, so his attempted back foot punch through cover point almost becomes a catch at deep third. Falls short of Naseem Shah. Next ball, his into the wicket tactics get Gill playing that old favourite short-arm jab. He nails it, but it he forgets to place it. Goes straight to short midwicket, where Khushdil Shah drops the catch. Australia took the catch in the 2023 ODI World Cup final.

Kohli came into this game with a question over his ability to deal with legspin. He's been dismissed by it five times in his last six games.

Pakistan's biggest threats are their fast bowlers so they've trusted that. It means Kohli gets to face pace right at the start of the innings and he likes pace. You want a batter like that being uncomfortable for the first 10 balls of his innings. That hasn't happened. You wonder if they could've thrown the ball to Abrar Ahmed for an exploratory over or two.

Shubman Gill has played some sumptuous shots, none better than a straight drive for four off Shaheen Afridi, and a lot of them seem to be a function of how conscious he is about where his front foot goes. He doesn't let it go too far forward. He especially doesn't let it go too far across.

Shaheen's biggest threat is the pitched up ball swinging in. If you set yourself up to bring a straight bat down, like Gill is, there can also be runs on offer when the ball doesn't swing. Good technique, though he does get beat by a corker - a ball that starts out swinging in, so he sets up to play a flick through midwicket, but changes its mind after pitching, going away to take the leading edge.

A scorcher. 143 kph inswinging yorker. That's Shaheen Afridi's signature stamped all over this game.

It almost felt like he'd decided to ditch the yorker after it didn't quite work in the earlier overs. There wasn't enough swing. So Shaheen shifted his length back. He event went slower ball. But that was smashed over the top for a one-handed four by Rohit, which triggered the fast bowler's temper and this is no ordinary fast bowler either. Shaheen's legs were pumping when he ran in. The stumps were splayed a mini-second after he let go. Nobody was getting bat to that. Least of all Rohit, who was not concentrating on defence.

India's captain falls. India's great hope arrives.

Virat Kohli 15 short of 14,000

Shaheen's speeds are up in this game. He's bowling 145 kph. And he's going yorker a lot. Three in his first over. Two in his second. But he's not getting enough swing. The last blockhole ball that he tried does not swing at all and ends up clattered through the covers by Gill.

Rohit goes past 9,000 runs as an opener in ODIs, the sixth player up on this pantheon, and he gets there with a trademark pick-up shot against fast bowling. Minimal effort. Maximum impact.

"Rohit bhai likes to play more aerial shots, and tries to hit those big sixes. And I like to play along the ground, and I like to pierce those gaps. In between, if I see the bowler is under pressure, I like to go over the circle. I think that's the hallmark of us as a pair."

Shubman Gill was in a very giving mood at the pre-match press conference. He's basically revealed the cheat sheet that he and Rohit Sharma are using to function as one of the best ODI opening combinations. They just need to bulk up their sample size to earn the "ever" at the end of that sentence.

Can Pakistan clog up their favoured scoring areas? Shaheen Afridi, Naseem Shah and Haris Rauf at their best can dictate terms anywhere in the world. But are they at their best right now? There's a bit of doubt over them.

A slow pitch means manipulating the balls into gaps will be harder. And there was swing for the Indian quicks earlier this afternoon with the new ball. Tense passage of play this.

Harshit Rana takes the final wicket. It's never easy to bowl at this phase of the innings. His senior partner getting smashed showed that. But Rana's slower balls seem to be harder to pick up. He isn't doing anything funny with them. They're offcutters. But they dip. They dip late and ruin the batter's timing. Rana and Kuldeep in the death: 6.4-0-28-4.

Excellent work from Hardik too, who kept banging away short of a length. Pakistan weren't ready to throw him off that length so he just kept at it and at it and got the wickets of Babar Azam and Saud Shakeel. Two-forty-one is a decent but they probably left a few runs out there.

Pakistan are getting up towards 250, which will be a very decent total to work with. Slower ball doesn't work first ball. On pace ball to Haris Rauf disappears. We could be looking at those two hits again later tonight.

Khushdil Shah played a sprightly innings against New Zealand, his presence making a deeply difficult chase look, if you squinted just hard enough, almost possible. Has a simple method. Still base. Concentrates nice and hard on the ball. Holds his shape. Full swing of the arms into the leg side.

India should've finished their overs by now. But there's still 4.2 left. There will be some allowances for that mini-break for Shami to get treated for a potential shin injury which may be why the big screen at the ground says "three minutes behind"

There was a feeling, when Rizwan and Shakeel, were batting that they could afford to take a few more risks. But they held back. Pakistan's captain barely attempted any attacking shot in his entire innings. It had people wondering - including the likes of Ian Bishop on commentary - about whether this team trusts its middle-order batters.

India used to have a similar problem. There was a time when Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and Shikhar Dhawan would go into every game knowing they have to put a huge price on their wicket and that would dictate the way they play, the risks they take. They've moved on from that fear now. Pakistan clearly haven't, and their fears came true. They lost 3 for 11 in 19 balls and then 2 for 0 in two balls and an innings that was 151 for 2 is 212 for 7.

Salman pulls the plug a touch too early.

He's deceived by Kuldeep's googly.

Comes charging out of his crease.

Hits all across the line.

Gets a leading edge

Jadeja takes it inside the circle at cover.

Big shot. Ball doesn't go far. Perfect Kuldeep wicket

Pakistan will have to deal with 7.2 overs with their tail exposed.

And they don't get off to a good start.

Googly takes down Shaheen Afridi first ball

The broadcast has picked up on Rohit Sharma feeling his left hamstring a little bit.

He had to chase a reverse sweep from Khushdil Shah from cover, but didn't really go for it. Shreyas Iyer mopped up.

Rohit has remained on the field and even seemed to be messing with someone as he took a very late DRS call in the 40th over.

Pakistan have lost 3 for 11 in 19 balls between the 34th and 37th overs.

Axar takes out Rizwan

Hardik takes out Shakeel

Pressure builds

Jadeja strikes. Cuh-lean bowls Tayyab Tahir.

The turn on that ball proves this chase won't be easy.

Forget the chase, finishing this first innings on a high won't be easy either.

No wickets in 53.2 middle overs. Now two in two for India. Shakeel is gone. He can't make the most of his second life either.

Hardik gets another well-deserved wicket and his celebration suggests how much he's put into his bowling today. It isn't just exultation. It's a concerted scream. It keeps going. He knows that wicket has the potential to break the game and he is thrilled that his plans have come together.

Through his second spell, he's taken pace off more than he's put pace on and Shakeel's into his pull shot a bit early and the ball goes down deep midwicket's throat.

One ball after his reprieve though, Rizwan is bowled by Axar Patel. Sunil Gavaskar spots how that dismissal comes about, saying India had brought mid-on up to tempt the Pakistan captain, who takes the bait, comes down the track, swings hard, misses completely and is bowled. India's first wicket in the middle overs at the Champions Trophy. Only took 53.2 overs.

It's not all bad news for Pakistan though. This is the period in which they need to take advantage of the platform they've set and that's what Rizwan was trying to do. He didn't take any risks all through his innings. The fact that he was taking them now means the focus has shifted to taking full toll of the overs left.

Could have been two wickets - Shakeel's too - in the over had Kuldeep been able to take a catch running in at long-on. India could've got rid of both set batters.

A few annoyed people out there at the end of the 33rd over.

Hardik because Rizwan has just been dropped off his bowling, but it was a very tough catch to Harshit Rana running back over his shoulder at midwicket

Rizwan who sees his partner Shakeel saying two runs are enough on that ball with his back turned.

And a little before the catching chance, Shreyas Iyer wasn't really happy with no one backing up at the bowler's end for his throw which would have caught Shakeel short.

It's his fourth in 19 ODIs. It's been steady accumulation, typified by how he turns a good ball into a single. Shakeel has only played 29 dot balls in the innings. Rizwan, by comparison, has played 40 dot balls. Pakistan's captain has got into better rhythm now though. He's made 17 off his last 21 balls.

India have not been able to pick up any wickets in the middle overs of this Champions Trophy. That's 48 overs and counting...

vs Ban: 0 for 123 between 11 and 40
vs Pak: 0 for 69 between 11 and 28

Rizwan is 24 off 50 and he gets to a run every two balls only after scoring just his second boundary of the innings. It matches the fewest runs he's scored off the first 50 balls in ODI cricket.

At the other end though, Saud Shakeel is starting to show a little enterprise. He's bringing out the reverse sweeps to give India's spinners something different to think about.

India are catching up on their over-rate - catching up by the minute because a minute ago the big screen at the ground said 12 minutes behind but now it says 8 minutes behind

Pakistan's run-rate has come down from 5.2 in the first 10 overs to 2.7 in the next 10.

Rizwan, after getting off the mark with a boundary, has taken 34 balls to score his next 10 runs. Even now when he's starting to hit out, he's finding the fielders. Mis-hits a full-blooded pull shot and sees it go only as far as short midwicket. India have also been good, denying him spinners to face.

With only four of the 18 overs so far bowled by spin, India are 14 minutes behind on over rate, according to the broadcast. There was also that bit where Shami needed treatment on his shin (allowances will have been made for that)

Already signs of grip from the pitch. In the 17th over, Hardik digs a slower offcutter into it and has Shakeel playing way too early. The left-hander is also surprised by the tennis-ball bounce off the surface, coming up high enough to hit his glove as he tries to defend off the back foot.

Hardik's in the middle of a lovely spell (6-0-18-1). Focusing on and around the off stump. Getting some seam movement as well. Crucially, he's keeping the length on the shorter side, bringing in natural variation.

Pakistan break the shackles a bit with Shakeel scooping Axar for the first boundary in 32 balls. As advertised, this is not a 300 plays 300 game. Aim for 260. Then if you have wickets in hand in the last 10 overs, get to 280.

Pakistan's captain will already have planned to stay there till the end. He's 6 off 12 at the end of 13 overs having got a boundary away with his favourite sweep shot against the spinners. It was in response to his arrival that India had switched to pace.

Looks like that little trip off to the dressing room was just that. Little. His speeds are back up in the mid-to-late 130kph and his lengths are better as well. He isn't floating them up for the drive anymore, which is perhaps to be expected given he doesn't really have a new ball in his hand.

Direct hit to take out Imam-ul-Haq, who was going nowhere for 10 off 25. Now he's going straight to the pavilion for 10 off 26.

Axar Patel can do no wrong. There was the high of that momentum-turning innings in the T20 World Cup final. It cannot be understated how much confidence that would have given him and confidence bleeds into all things. India tapped into that, empowering him to be their No. 5 batter and often their first-change bowler.

Over the past year or 18 months, he's become an invaluable part of their white-ball cricket. Here, he produces their second breakthrough just by being extra alert at mid-on. Axar's accuracy with his left-arm spin is his USP. Looks like his throws are just as accurate.

He was shadow boxing some unseen enemy one ball. Next ball, he's waving bye-bye to Babar. India are so lucky to have Hardik Pandya.

He's good enough to take the new ball. He's good enough to take out Pakistan's main man. He's good enough to change the complexion of this game, which until now was about India losing their lead bowler Mohammed Shami. He's also good enough to bat in the top five. Last night, after England's loss, Nasser Hussain spoke of how Ben Stokes balances their XI and how he was a huge miss. Hardik is a player in the same mold. He's fit and firing.

He didn't look in perfect rhythm. Then, in the middle of his third over, walking back to his mark, he calls the physio out and it seems there might be something wrong with his right shin. He was able to finish the over but then immediately exits the ground. Shami had missed all of India's cricket since the end of the 2023 World Cup with a knee injury. The rehab part was hell. Pakistan lost Fakhar Zaman off the second ball of their opening game of this Champions Trophy and never recovered. Are India on that path now?

With some movement on offer, India have tried to pitch the ball up a little further, but that's ended up hurting them. Babar and Imam were able to put away a few nice drives. Towards the end of the fourth over, they pulled their lengths back and began building pressure

A bit of a wayward start from Mohammed Shami. Three wides in the first five balls to Imam-ul-Haq. Is that nerves or has he not calibrated his radar to the left-hander? Bit of both probably

You know how bowlers get to bowl two overs back to back in the Hundred? You don't? Well, they do. And Shami's recreated that here with an 11-ball first over. Very wayward. Six runs to Pakistan, only one off the bat. What a bonus.

Babar and Imam are both very similar kind of batters. They take their time to settle in and then open up. But Pakistan might want at least one of them to throw a few punches early on. With the field up and the ball coming on nicely, this is the best time to bat.

'Home' captain Mohammed Rizwan wins a crucial toss in a game that Pakistan have to win to stay in the Champions Trophy. He understands the advantage of putting a total on the board and takes it immmediately. One change Fakhar Zaman is out and Imam-ul-Haq has taken his place.

Pakistan: 1 Babar Azam, 2 Imam-ul-Haq, 3 Saud Shakeel, 4 Mohammad Rizwan (capt), 5 Salman Agha, 6 Tayyan Tahir, 7 Khushdil Shah, 8 Shaheen Afridi, 9 Naseem Shah, 10 Haris Rauf, 11 Abrar Ahmed

Rohit Sharma says what he wanted to do at the toss now doesn't matter. He says the pitch looks on the slower side (which means without any dew, it will keep getting slower, and will become harder to score in the second innings). He backs his team to cope with that though. No changes for India

India: 1 Rohit Sharma (capt), 2 Shubman Gill, 3 Virat Kohli, 4 Shreyas Iyer, 5 Axar Patel, 6 KL Rahul, 7 Hardik Pandya, 8 Ravindra Jadeja, 9 Harshit Rana, 10 Kuldeep Yadav, 11 Mohammed Shami

The pitch to be used today has already been used before (twice). For context, that Ind-Ban game was played on a FRESH pitch and that slowed down massively as the game went on. Both teams will want to maximise the powerplay because when the field spreads, it's going to be really hard to score. Long straight boundary (81m). Even square boundaries (70m both). Sunil Gavaskar says it won't be easy to hit sixes here, and his feeling is 270 could be a score that could be defended.

The toss could be huge. Batting first and batting big, provided there's no dew - and last week the groundstaff said there hasn't been any dew all year plus its a 1pm start so by the time dew comes in, the game will be done - could pretty much amount to a victory.

This game is so big and it pulls everything into it. Us fans. Them players. Entire cities.

Centurion’s pace and bounce made 2003. And that upper cut for six.

Sharjah still echoes the sound of Miandad’s bat creating history.

Melbourne’s 90,293 brought an otherworldly feeling to 2022.

Chennai gathers folklore with every passing year. The ground seats 40,000 but millions of people say they were there.

Dubai will undoubtedly bring its own colour as well. Just that on Thursday it was all very grey with a slow pitch making strokeplay very difficult.

India's spin-heavy bowling attack have plenty of practice on how to harness conditions like that and squeeze opposition batting line-ups. Pakistan have lost a lot of batting firepower to injury but ironically enough the players they do have are known (sometimes infamously) to possess a method that might well come in handy on these tired pitches. Steady, risk-free run-accumulation.

Babar Azam was pilloried for it in the last game, which Pakistan lost.

He might well be celebrated for it, if Pakistan go on to win this one. And they do need to win this one. Otherwise they might get kicked out of their own party.