Asia Cup, 2018: Three reasons why India beat Pakistan

Enter cap — India completely outplayed Pakistan

India thumped Pakistan in the match of the Asia Cup by 8 wickets and 126 balls to spare -their largest victory against the Green Army in terms of balls to spare. Having narrowly defeated Hong Kong, Rohit Sharma and Co. made light work of Pakistan to win two matches on the trot.

After a poor start to Pakistan's innings, Shoaib Malik (43) and young Babar Azam (47) got their team back into the game, but a late flurry of wickets that led to a total of 162 and some ordinary bowling from their seamers meant that the game was out of their reach. Ultimately, they were outplayed in every department - it was India all day, all afternoon, all evening.

While chasing a target of 163, the captain scored a quick-fire 50 to lay a platform. Kedar Jadhav picked up three wickets and was the pick of the bowlers alongside Bhuvaneshwar Kumar, who ended up with 3 for 15 of 7 overs.

Here are three reasons why India beat Pakistan.

#3 Strong opening partnership

Image result for shikar dhawan and rohit sharma asia cup — Formidable, as always

Yes, the total was a mere 162. Yes, the pressure was on the opposition. Yes, the ball was coming to the bat quite nicely. But, you still have to go out there and serve the purpose. Rohit Sharma and his deputy Skikhar Dhawan did exactly that. While Dhawan missed out on his half-century by four runs, Sharma amassed 52 runs.

Although the players seem pretty relaxed, a few nerves would have been playing on everybody's minds. The opening duo put up 86 runs for the first wicket, before the skipper got bowled by a peach from Shadab Khan. There was nothing extraordinary in the approach taken by the Indians, however. Both of them went about their business in a simple manner.

While Sharma put away the shorter balls comfortably in the Power Play to keep a healthy run rate, Dhawan relied on the flicks, cover drives and square drives to collect his runs. The highlight of their game was that both of them didn't try to do anything out of thin air. Instead, the pair played to their strengths. Courtesy of their professionalism upfront, the Blues won this encounter comfortably.