MUMBAI, 18 October 2007 — Indian spinner Murali Karthik put in an exceptional all-round performance to fashion India’s two-wicket win in the seventh and final One-Day International against Australia here yesterday.
The 31-year-old picked a career-best 6-27 before scoring a cameo 21 under pressure to gift India a consolatory win in the seven-match series which Australia clinched 4-2. The opener was abandoned due to rain.
Coming in at 143-8, Karthik shared an unbeaten 52-run stand with Zaheer Khan (31 not out) as India overhauled Australia’s modest total of 193 with 24 balls to spare in the day-night game.
Mitchell Johnson picked best figures of 3-46 for the visitors while Nathan Bracken took 2-30.
“We did not have a good series so we wanted to end with a win. Our batsmen failed to shoulder responsibility but credit to the tail-enders for batting superbly today,” Indian skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni said.
“It was a gamble I took by having (Murali) Karthik included in the squad. I would have been at the receiving end if he had not delivered.” Indians fumbled in their chase, losing six wickets with just 64 on the board. Saurav Ganguly was out for a duck off the fourth ball of the innings while Sachin Tendulkar played onto his stumps for 21 on his home ground. The other senior player of the team — Rahul Dravid — was benched, for only the second time in his career, following his prolonged form slump. In the last nine innings, the batsman averaged 8.8 with three ducks.
His replacement Dinesh Karthik failed to do much, being dismissed for a duck by Johnson who also accounted for Ganguly.
But Robin Uthappa salvaged the innings with a 59-ball 47 inclusive of four fours and two sixes while also adding 65 runs with Harbhajan Singh for the seventh wicket.
Adam Gilchrist took four catches, the last of which took him to a record 400-mark.
“We fought really hard but Karthik bowled beautifully. I thought 193 was defendable but it was a great effort from India in the end,” Australian skipper Ricky Ponting said.
Earlier, man-of-the-match Karthik flummoxed the Australians in a sensational spell of slow bowling which saw him miss out on hat tricks twice. He dismissed Brad Hodge (16) and Andrew Symonds off the last two balls of the 20th over before returning to send back Brad Haddin (19), Brad Hogg and Brett Lee in the 32nd.
James Hopes (22) became the sixth victim of the bowler who was picked midway through the series after 20 months in wilderness. Karthik’s figures just fell short of the best-ever by an Indian spinner, a record held by Anil Kumble who took 6 for 12 against West Indies in Kolkata in 1993.
Ponting top-scored with 57 off 78 balls with nine fours and shared two half-century stands with Gilchrist (19) and Hodge to lend respectability to the total after electing to bat on a lively wicket. Ponting raced to his half-century with the help of nine fours to become the first one-day captain to score 50 fifties. New Zealand’s former captain Stephen Fleming is second in the list with 45.
Symonds, in the news for his run-ins with Indian players and allegedly being the target of racial abuse during the fifth game at Vadodara, was booed by a section of the 40,000-strong crowd as he made his ground.
The two teams will square off in a Twenty20 game here on Saturday, their last encounter in an eventful series.
