IND vs OMA

What a beautiful game of cricket. Oman wins hearts. Their captain, Jatinder Singh, is such a warm and bubbly character. This is Dwaipayan Mukherjee, pulling the curtains down alongside Darpan Tikiya. We will see you soon! 

Suryakumar Yadav (India captain): "(Jokes) I'll try to bat higher in the next game. Overall impression: Oman played an unbelievable brand of cricket. I knew with their coach Sulu sir (Sulakshan Kulkarni), there would be some khadoos cricket. (On Harshit Rana and Arshdeep Singh) It is not easy to come off the bench in these hot and humid conditions. They did well. Hardik did well in the field and with the ball. He gets a plus one there. All set for Super 4s."

Jatinder Singh (Oman Captain) : "Extremely proud of the unit, they showed excellent character. We were under pressure but how we were able to respond for large parts of the match was commendable. The hype of the tournament was there in the mind. I mentioned earlier that we lack some experience and exposure. Moving forward, we have the World Cup qualifiers in Oman and we are very ready for that. Jiten is a high utility player, I was telling him that the run out, in the manner that he did it not once but twice in this game is developing into his favourite kind of dismissal! He is a team man and the energy with which he walks around is truly commendable. We are grouped with Papua New Guinea and Samoa and we saw the kind of performance we can show against the top ranked team in the world."

Sanju Samson is the Player of the Match. He says, "It was a bit humid and hot there. Working on the fitness for the last few weeks. We have got a new trainer and have taken the bronco test recently. Good to contribute. Credit to Oman. They bowled and batted well. I took some time to get my eye in. Any contribution you make for your team is what you take in your stride. So, happy."

10:38 PM local time, 12:08 AM IST | The Oman players are in a huddle and guess who's doing the talking? Suryakumar Yadav. Yes, the Indian skipper is probably giving out some words of advice. And just as we type this, the entire Oman team and support staff pose for a picture with him. Probably a night that they won't forget for a long time. 

10:31 PM local time , 12:01 AM IST | India (188 for 8) defeat Oman (167 for 4) by 21 runs

Aamir Kaleem - 64 (46) | Kuldeep Yadav - 1/23
Hammad Mirza - 51 (33) | Harshit Rana - 1/25

Oman saved their best cricket for the last group stage game and against the best team in the tournament! They have been extremely impressive! India were a bit worried at one stage when the Mirza and Kaleem stand was going great guns! One must really applaud the execution by Oman!

When India struck 188 batting first, a lot of the mid- match talk was about how well Oman would have done had they batted their full allocation of 20 overs. But little did the world know that Jatinder and his men had other plans in place. Oman's opening pair looked very decisive and confident with their shots. There were no tentative pushes or anything of that sort against Arshdeep and Pandya which prompted the early introduction of the first change bowler - Harshit Rana - as early as in the 4th over of the chase. No wickets were lost in the power play as Oman were calculative with their assault. The last time India did not pick a wicket inside the first 6 overs was against Sri Lanka (36/0) in July 2024 (14 games before).

This was also the first time that Oman had gone wicketless against a full-member team in the powerplay. Kuldeep Yadav, introduced as soon as the field restrictions were removed, overstepped in his first delivery of the night. It was only the 2nd time that an associate nation got a half century stand against India. The first time was against Afghanistan when they were yet to acquire full member status. The 56 run opening stand was broken when Kuldeep Yadav got a ball to hurry off the pitch and got through the defences of the Oman captain. 

SKY took out every ammunition from the closet to ensure that each of his bowling options are firing well, and that none of them are rusty. 8 bowlers are the joint-most India has used in a T20I game. Today was the 5th time they had used as many in an innings.

India's bowling attack appeared dulled without Bumrah's presence. Irrespective of the opposing team's calibre, he possesses the skill to secure early wickets and dictate terms from the start, influencing the tempo of the innings. They seemed to also miss Varun's impact, who has arguably emerged as India's pivotal bowler during middle overs. Not forgetting, he's currently ranked as the world's top T20I bowler. Oman's 2nd wicket stand brought up another half century milestone as Kaleem pushed his scoring rate in a very useful innings. 

The opener backed up his 2 wickets while bowling with his 2nd T20I fifty of his career. He becomes the oldest player to score a fifty in T20 Asia Cups. Only Bravo, Watson and Shanaka had taken 2 wickets and scored a 50 in the same T20 match against India and now Aamir Kaleem got himself to that elite list. Hammad Mirza began hammering on the other end to give Oman an outside chance of really pulling off the upset of the tournament. When Kuldeep returned for his 2nd spell in the 16th over, Mirza treated him to consecutive sixes. 

Kaleem played the field beautifully and it required the fielding brilliance of Pandya to end the magnificent 2nd wicket stand that gave a real scare to the Indian fans. Mirza and Kaleem's 93-run partnership marks Oman's biggest stand versus a full-member country. Simultaneously, this represents India's largest conceded partnership against an Associate nation. The first ball of the last over of the match saw Arshdeep Singh bring up his 100th T20I wicket, first for India and the 3rd fastest to the milestone, only behind Rashid Khan (53) and Wanindu Hasaranga (63) - the left armer has done it in 64 matches - at only 26 years of age - after making his debut on June 2022. 

Oman fall short only by 21 runs at the end. Join us for the presentations shortly!

19.6 Arshdeep Singh to Jiten Ramanandi, SQUIRTED AWAY FOR FOUR! A good shot, to cap off a good showing by Oman. However, despite all the experiments they did, India win this match comfortably and head into the Super 4s undefeated. This was a full ball, at the stumps. Jiten once again stood outside leg and was able to slice it through the backward point region. 

19.5 Arshdeep Singh to Jiten Ramanandi, another fiery yorker, follows up the batter who stood outside leg. Ends up sneaking through to the keeper. 

19.4 Arshdeep Singh to Jiten Ramanandi, FOUR MORE! He shuffles to the leg side early. Arshdeep follows up with a hard length ball. Jiten swung hard and the ball went sailing over mid-on.

19.3 Arshdeep Singh to Jiten Ramanandi, DRILLED FOR FOUR! Arshdeep failed to land the yorker. Ended up being a half-volley at the stumps. Punched past mid-off's left. 

19.2 Arshdeep Singh to Jiten Ramanandi, shuffles to the leg side early. Arshdeep follows him up with a yorker that sneaks through to the keeper after evading Jiten's bat.

19.1 Arshdeep Singh to Vinayak Shukla, CAUGHT! 100th T20I wicket for Arshdeep Singh. Becomes the first Indian to do so. Back of a length ball, delivered from over the wicket, in line with the stumps. Shukla went for the pull shot — after all there is not other option at this stage — and ended up holing out to deep midwicket. 

Ashish: "Oman will get a lot of experience even if this match is out of their hands but they should be appreciated. They are playing a lot better than some of the best teams."
Absolutely, the kind of fight that they have shown in this match is praiseworthy!