Eng beat Pak in 2nd T20 to level series 1-1

Dubai: Jonny Bairstow hit a maiden half-century and paceman Steven Finn took three wickets to guide England to a comfortable 38-run win in the second Twenty20 international against Pakistan on Saturday.

Bairstow's 60 off 46 balls, studded with two sixes and five boundaries, helped England recover from a precarious 79-4 to post a challenging 150-7 before Finn claimed 3-30 to bowl Pakistan out for 112 in 18.2 overs at Dubai Stadium.

England's victory levelled the Twenty20 series and set up an intriguing third and final match in Abu Dhabi on Monday.

Pakistan were off to a disastrous start as Finn had Mohammad Hafeez (nought) caught off the second ball of the innings and then removed a threatening Umar Akmal (19 off 12).

Pakistan were dealt further crucial blows when Awais Zia (six), Asad Shafiq (one) and Shoaib Malik (12) were out, leaving half the side back in the pavilion for just 50.

Shahid Afridi (25) lifted the tempo with two boundaries and a six off Samit Patel, taking 17 off the left-arm spinner's 12th over, but England hit back by dismissing Misbah-ul Haq (13) at the other end.

Hammad Azam (21 off 15 balls) hit a four and a six off Ravi Bopara as Pakistan accumulated 11 off the 14th over and then hit two boundaries off skipper Stuart Broad to reduce the target to 54 off the last five.

But Bopara dismissed Azam to once more peg Pakistan back at 98-7 and the task of getting 39 in the last two overs proved too much. Broad and Graeme Swann took two wickets apiece.

"We talked about the comeback and I think the guys showed a lot of character," said Broad. "To set 151 I think we were well set to win and then the bowlers did a wonderful job."

Pakistan captain Misbah blamed poor batting by his teammates.

"I think 151 was a gettable target because the wicket had nothing for the bowlers," said Misbah. "But we had a very poor start and then lost wickets regularly and you don't win matches after that."

Earlier Bairstow made an unbeaten 60 off 46 balls, studded with five boundaries and two sixes, to help England recover after Broad won the toss and opted to bat.

Bairstow, who made his debut last year, improved on his unbeaten 22 he made during England's eight-run defeat in the first match on Thursday, opened up with a four off Afridi and hit a six in the leg-spinner's next to lift the scoring rate.

Bairstow added 39 for the fifth wicket with Patel (13) and then hit Umar Gul for a six before the bowler finished with 2-31.

England got off to a flying start, making 35 by the fifth over before Pakistan hit back by dismissing Kevin Pietersen (17), Bopara (one) and Eoin Morgan (nine) in the space of 14 runs.

Bairstow and opener Craig Kieswetter (31) added 30 for the fourth wicket as Pakistan bowled well in the middle overs.

2nd Test: Ajmal late strikes peg back England

Abu Dhabi: Pakistan offspinner Saeed Ajmal removed Alastair Cook for 94 and took two more late wickets to restrict England to 207-5 and ensure the second Test is poised at stumps on Thursday after the second day.

Cook hit 10 boundaries in batting for nearly five hours and Jonathan Trott scored a gritty 74 with seven boundaries, but England lost 3-9 late in the day to trail by 50 runs after having bowled out Pakistan for 257 earlier in the morning.

Ajmal went wicketless for 24 overs before dismissing Cook, Kevin Pietersen (14) and Eoin Morgan (3) in his last five to finish with 3-67.

Ajmal mesmerized England's batsmen last week in taking 10-97 to inspire Pakistan to a 10-wicket win in the first Test at Dubai.

Cook put on 139 for the second wicket with Trott before he was out leg-before-wicket when he looked set for his 20th Test century.

Trott should have been out lbw on 22 off Ajmal, but Pakistan failed to ask for a television referral when replays showed that the ball would have hit the top of middle and off-stump.

Becoming frustrated with the stand, Pakistan wasted both their referrals on Trott before and after he had completed his half-century off 95 balls with six fours.

Both England batsmen were watchful as Pakistan failed to take a wicket in the second session on a pitch that offered assistance to the slow bowlers.

Left-arm spinner Abdur Rehman broke the stand after tea when Trott missed the line of the ball which brushed his off-stump.

England had lost skipper Andrew Strauss before lunch after having ended Pakistan's innings inside 15 minutes of Thursday's play.

The out-of-form captain struggled for 42 balls before falling to offspinner Mohammad Hafeez, before Trott and Cook joined in for a stand lasting nearly 3½ hours.

Strauss scored only 16 and 9 in the first Test and looked out of sorts on Thursday against spin, with Pakistan captain Misbah-ul-Haq deploying his slow bowlers as early as the sixth over.

Strauss succumbed when a big deflection from his bat onto his pads offered a simple catch to Asad Shafiq close to the pitch.

Earlier, Pakistan added only one run to their overnight score of 256-7 before Stuart Broad and James Anderson ended the innings in the space of 16 deliveries.

Broad finished with 4-47 after trapping Misbah lbw off his fourth delivery, which nipped back into the Pakistan captain. Misbah hit five fours and four sixes in his 84. He used the referral but TV umpire Billy Bowden upheld onfield umpire Steve Davis' decision.

Anderson trapped Ajmal lbw and forced Junaid Khan to loop a catch to slips to end the innings and enable the swing bowler to finish with 2-46.

Offspinner Graeme Swann took 3-52 while recalled spinner Monty Panesar had 1-91.

Cook closes on double century as India wilt

BIRMINGHAM, England, Aug 11  - Alastair Cook stroked his 19th test century as England's ruthless batsmen amassed 456 for three on the second day of the third test against a weary-looking India on Thursday.

The prolific opener was 182 not out at the close having started the day on 27. Eoin Morgan was also unbeaten on 44 while captain Andrew Strauss fell for 87 off a no-ball that was not spotted, Kevin Pietersen made 63 and Ian Bell 34.

England sailed past India's first innings 224 to lead by 232 runs at Edgbaston. With three days remaining and seven wickets in hand, the hosts are well placed to take an unassailable 3-0 lead in the four-match series.

Cook moved ahead of David Gower, Michael Vaughan and Pietersen in the list of test centurions and is now level with Strauss and Len Hutton, with only five Englishmen in front of the trio.

The left hander has batted for more than eight hours and faced 339 deliveries to extend a purple patch that now contains seven centuries in his last 13 tests.

It has been a chanceless innings albeit with a few boundaries off the edge.

India's bowling was ineffective, lacking the control to halt England's free scoring plus penetration on a pitch that has become increasingly easy to bat on.

The fielding also disappointed with Rahul Dravid dropping Bell on 30 at first slip off Shanthakumaran Sreesanth, who later spilled an easy catch at point off Ishant Sharma's bowling when Morgan was on 17.

Dravid also dropped Morgan on 43 off Suresh Raina, another simple chance.

The ease of England's run spree was demonstrated by the normally cautious Cook, who reverse-swept Amit Mishra for three just after lunch.

FLUENT STRAUSS

Strauss's fluent innings lasted 176 deliveries and he fell when he tried to sweep Mishra only to deflect the ball off his pad and on to the leg stump.

The England skipper was seeking his first test century at home in two years but Mishra had over-stepped the crease and Australian umpire Simon Taufel did not notice.

Strauss and Cook put on 186 for the first wicket, their fourth highest partnership.

Cook went to three figures with a single to mid-wicket, reaching the milestone from 213 balls. He later raised his 150 with a thumping pull shot off Sreesanth.

The only other successes for India were the wickets of Bell, bowled by Praveen Kumar with a delivery that swung away and knocked over his off stump, and Pietersen who looked in ominously good form during his 78-ball stay.

Pietersen stepped across his stumps to Kumar and was hit on the pads. Umpire Steve Davis raised his finger and the batsman stood his ground in disbelief for almost 10 seconds before appearing to glare at the official as he walked off.

More bad news for India came when the odd delivery from Mishra and Raina turned prodigiously in the evening session -- a sight that would certainly encourage England off spinner Graeme Swann.

England will go to number one in the world rankings if they win here.

Flower happy with England cricket under captain Cook

MANCHESTER, United Kingdom  - England coach Andy Flower has hailed the progress of the side under one-day skipper Alastair Cook as they prepare for series against Test table-toppers and 50-over world champions India.

Cook, not even in England's side when they suffered a 10-wicket World Cup quarter-final thrashing by Sri Lanka earlier this year, marked his first series as permanent one-day captain with 298 runs at 74.50 and a strike rate of 96.75 in a 3-2 series win over the islanders wrapped up last weekend.

That followed England's 1-0 Test campaign triumph against Sri Lanka and was the best possible counter to those who, like ex-England captain Michael Atherton believed Cook, now one of the world's leading Test batsmen, to be a "plodder" in the shorter format.

Flower, who saw Cook come through the ranks at Essex and was himself a world-class left-handed batsman while representing Zimbabwe, was delighted with both the progress of England and his limited overs skipper.

"It was a very good test," he said after England's 16-run series-clinching win at Old Trafford last weekend.

"They are a very good one-day side, World Cup finalists recently, and three of the five tracks weren't ideal English conditions -- so I think we've done very well to win."

Flower, turning to Cook, added: "He had some tricky decisions to make throughout the series, and he was under pressure from a number of quarters.

"I thought he handled that pressure really well, and made some really good decisions out there in this last match.

"He had to be very flexible, and he was."

Cook deputised as both Test and one-day captain when Andrew Strauss, still the Test skipper, opted out of last year's tour of Bangladesh and Flower said: "We saw him handle pressure well there too, which isn't an easy tour.

"He grew there as a leader, and without doubt this series will have helped him grow too.

"(England batting coach) Graham Gooch has worked very closely with him on his batting for a long time -- because obviously one-day cricket is very different to Test cricket.

"I think he's adapted well.

"It might not look as pretty as a (Mahela) Jayawardene, but it's been even more effective during this series.

"He should feel very proud of his contribution with the bat, and how he's handled some of the pressure he's been under."

Cook and England return to Test cricket with the first of a four-match series against India starting at Lord's on July 21.

Dernbach seals England's series win over Sri Lanka

MANCHESTER, England  - Jade Dernbach held his nerve as England beat Sri Lanka by 16 runs in the fifth one-day international at Old Trafford to seal a 3-2 series win over the World Cup finalists on Saturday.

Sri Lanka, chasing 269 for victory, finished on 252 all out with 10 balls of their innings left.

Dernbach dismissed dangerman Angelo Mathews for a near run-a-ball 62 with a clever slower ball that the all-rounder sliced to Tim Bresnan at backward point.

He then finished the match by yorking Lasith Malinga for a return of two for 49.

The tourists were in trouble at 131 for five, needing 138 more runs to win, when Mathews and Jeevan Mendis came together with 20 overs left.

But their sixth-wicket partnership of 102 troubled England until Mendis holed out to the left-arm spin of Samit Patel.

Malinga struck James Anderson for six to get the tourists' target down to 17 off 12 balls.

But Dernbach's double strike gave England captain Alastair Cook a win in his first series in permanent charge of the one-day side and his team a measure of revenge after a 10-wicket World Cup quarter-final defeat by Sri Lanka in Colombo in March.

Man-of-the-series Cook, who also starred in the preceding 1-0 Test series win over the islanders, was delighted by the way England kept their composure in the first tight match out of the five one-dayers.

"To play well under the pressure of a deciding match was very pleasing," he told Sky Sports.

"We don't want it to be close but we handled the pressure excellently today (Saturday)."

Sri Lanka's reply got off to a dreadful start as they slumped to 12 for two inside four overs, fast-medium bowler Bresnan removing both openers on his way to three for 49 in nine overs.

Debutant batsman Dimuth Karunaratne edged Bresnan to Jonathan Trott at first slip for four and captain Tillakaratne Dilshan fell for the same score when he pulled the Yorkshireman straight to Dernbach at long leg.

Batting ace Mahela Jayawardene managed just nine before he mistimed a drive off Anderson to Cook at mid-off to the delight of a capacity 19,000 crowd.

Dinesh Chandimal counter-attacked by driving Bresnan for six and repeating the dose against off-spinner Graeme Swann.

But Chandimal, who made a superb unbeaten hundred in Sri Lanka's six-wicket win at Lord's last weekend, was out for 54 when he raced down the pitch to Swann only to be beaten in flight before being stumped by Craig Kieswetter.

Chandimal's exit ended a partnership of 94 with experienced left-hander Kumar Sangakkara that had taken Sri Lanka to 123 for four in the 27th over.

Sangakkara followed soon afterwards, chopping on to Bresnan for 48.

That England made 268 for nine was largely down to a fourth-wicket stand of 118 between man-of-the-match Trott (72) and Eoin Morgan (57).

They had initially appeared set for a huge total when Cook put on 85 in quick time with Kieswetter after winning the toss to follow the pair's unbroken stand of 171 in a crushing 10-wicket win at Trent Bridge on Wednesday.

Cook, who had made 119 and 95 not out in his previous two innings, was deceived on 31 by a sharply turning ball from Suraj Randiv and stumped by Sangakkara.

That was the first of five wickets for off-spinner Randiv, who finished with a career-best five for 42, surpassing his previous best return of three for 23 against Zimbabwe in Bulawayo last year.

Trott then completed his patient fifty before an unlucky dismissal saw a pull off Randiv get caught up in his body and trickle onto the stumps before he could kick the ball away.

"It was a lot easier coming in after Cook and Kieswetter had done such a good job," said Trott.

"There is a lot of belief in our changing room and we're very pleased to have beaten Sri Lanka in conditions today that are similar to Colombo."