Sachin's 65 only saving grace, India bundled out for 162 by Windie

Kinrara Oval, Sep 20: Sachin Tendulkar stood tall among the ruins with a valiant 65 as Team India folded for a paltry 162 in the must-win fifth one-dayer of the tri-nation DLF Cup against the West Indies here today.

Sachin was the lone Indian to put up a fight, scoring 65, as Indian innings crumbled against the guiles of Dwayne Smith and Chris Gayle.

Military medium pace bowling of Smith claimed four wickets as Indian top-order crumbled once again. Skipper Rahul Dravid, vice captain Virender Sehwag, Suresh Raina and Yuvraj Singh all went back to pavilion falling to Smith.

Agarkar was cleaned up by Bravo as India finished their 20 overs at 78 for six. However, other than some reckless batting in face of disciplined bowling, erratic nature of the pitch was also playing in the minds of the Indian batsmen.

India is playing on the same pitch that had bad ridge with uneven bounce in their earlier match against West Indies. Sehwag got out to a ball that kept really low and after 15 overs, the same ridge started acting funny once again with balls barely keeping boot height.

India lost two quick wickets after deciding to bat first on winning the toss. First to go was Dravid who edged to keeper Carlton Baugh for nought in the first over itself. Sehwag followed him in the third over bowled to Smith. Raina was promoted up the order and the young left hander looked to consolidate with his senior partner Sachin Tendulkar but couldn't stand for long falling to military medium pace bowling of Smith for 11.

Yuvraj, who made a three ball duck in the last match against Australia, fared only little better, surviving four balls this time but couldn't open his account once again.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni played his usual quick-fire knock but the need of hour was staying at crease. Dhoni hit three fours off Collymore in one over and followed that with another cover drive for four in the next over off the same bolwer.

But Collymore had the last laugh when he castled him for 18 off 13 balls with four fours. Ajit Agarkar was clean bowled by Bravo and the Indian innings entered the tails in the 19th over itself.

Sachin Tendulkar was the lone batsman to look solid as always.

His trade mark cover drives were there as were flick off the pads for four. But Sachin was restrained a bit with wickets falling at alarming rate at the other end. Sachin found an ideal partner in Harbhajan Singh who showed enough resilience to hang in there.

Harbhajan chanced his arms too, hitting two sixes when the ball was in the slot to hit. Harbhajan and Sachin raised India's only fifty-run partnership of the innings.

Harbhajan was looking good for many more when he tried to cut Gayle but could only manage to edge to keeper Baugh for 37.

Harbhajan and Sachin added 78 runs for the seventh wicket.

Sachin, who had played a faultless knock met a tragic end when he was run out. RP Singh hit Samuels straight back to the bowler who just guided the ball to stumps at runner's end. Sachin was short of crease and went out for 65 off 102 balls with seven well timed hits to fence.

Not much resistance was on offer from the remaining batsmen as the Indian innings folded at 162 in just 39.3 overs.

Earlier, India made one change bringing in Sreesanth for Irfan Pathan. West Indies also brought in Collymore and Runako Morton.

UNI