Some bowlers intimidate batsmen but it is a rare genius who intimidates bowlers as Sachin Tendulkar did in the high-voltage match against Pakistan when his competitive juices were flowing.It was heady stuff!And India will now take much more than just the points from their impressive six-wicket win against their traditional rivals through to the business end of this World Cup.India booked its passage through to the Super Six stage and the win on Saturday continued the revival of the team since the demoralising defeat by the Australians at the start of the tournament. In this form Ganguly and his team are capable of beating anyone but they must believe in themselves and be prepared to play with the freedom they have shown in recent matches.Pakistan have yet to win a World Cup match against India and if they are to do so they need to develop some subtlety to go with the sledge-hammer approach. Full frontal assault has not done the trick for them so far.Thankfully it was a day game because Pakistan won the toss and decided to bat on an excellent batting wicket. Nehra for one found conditions very different from those experienced at Kingsmead the other evening.Saeed Anwar continued with his love affair of Indian bowling in one-day cricket with an innings that started tentatively but grew into the more assured and elegant version of Anwar that we have come to know and appreciate.The total of 273 would have been excellent had it been a night game but as conditions were not going to change in the afternoon Pakistan would have felt uneasy about the Indian top order, especially Tendulkar.Early wickets were always going to be important for Pakistan to make the score resemble 300, so Waqar Younis decided to go with his big guns Shoaib Akhtar and Wasim Akram. For India to win it would probably take someone to make 100 so Tendulkar would have loomed large in the sights of the Pakistani pace trio.The showdown got away to an explosive start. Neither Akram nor Shoaib had a chance to settle in before Tendulkar struck the first psychological blows by despatching both bowlers to various parts of the ground. And once Tendulkar and Kaif, promoted in the batting order, departed it was left to Dravid and Yuvraj Singh to see India home in what had been another in the titanic contests between these two proud nations. (PTI)
