Champions Trophy encounter: Pakistan concedes to India in one-sided contest
Title-holders India came out as the superior side against their arch-rivals, defeating Pakistan by 124 runs in a match marred by rain and sloppy fielding.
The match ended as Hasan Ali returned to the pavillion with no runs scored. Pakistan ended their innings at 164/9 after 33.4 overs with injured last man Wahab Riaz unable to bat as India won with 44 balls to spare.
India had previously piled up 319 for three in 48 overs after Pakistan captain Sarfraz Ahmed won the toss, giving their opponents a revised target of 289 owing to the Duckworth–Lewis method.
Rohit Sharma top-scored with 91 and put on 136 for the first wicket with Shikhar Dhawan (68).
India captain Virat Kohli made 81 not out, sharing a quickfire third-wicket stand with Yuvraj Singh (53) as Pakistan paid a heavy price for dropping both batsmen.
India plundered 72 runs in their final four overs as Pakistan's attack wilted.
Pakistan skipper Sarfraz Ahmed won the toss and opted to bowl first.
India started the game slow with a run rate of just 4.84 in the first powerplay, which the ICC says is the lowest of any side during the tournament so far. Play was temporarily halted for rain 9.5 overs into the match.
Although the pressure for today's match is high, Sarfraz was confident Pakistans' batting has improved.
"It is a good pitch and won't change much. India-Pakistan is a pressure game, hopefully we play as a free game. Our batting is much better," he said.
In an interview yesterday, Sarfraz had said Pakistan will be "playing differently" and spectators would see some "out of the box things".
"We have definitely have a plan... you will see us doing some new things which have not been tried against India before," he said.
The team's fielding, however, leaves much to be desired, with commentators referring to it today as 'sloppy' on more than one occasion since the innings began.
The last time Pakistan defeated India in an ICC tournament was during the 2009 Champions Trophy at Centurion. Since then, India has won all six encounters.
Squads
Pakistan: Azhar Ali, Ahmed Shehzad, Babar Azam, Mohammad Hafeez, Shoaib Malik, Sarfraz Ahmed (wk, c), Imad Wasim, Mohammad Amir, Shadab Khan, Wahab Riaz, Hasan Ali
India: RG Sharma, S Dhawan, V Kohli (c), Yuvraj Singh, MS Dhoni (wk), KM Jadhav, HH Pandya, RA Jadeja, B Kumar, UT Yadav, JJ Bumrah
