India won the ICC U-19 World Cup 2022 title for the record fifth time in history, defeating England in the final played at the North Sound ground in Antigua on Saturday. Chasing 190 to win, India scored 195/6 with Nishant Sindhu scoring an unbeaten 50 from 54 balls and Shaik Rasheed making 50, while Raj Bawa setting up the victory with a splendid five-wicket haul and 35 runs to win the Man of the Match award for his all-round brilliance.
The historic win was earlier set up by the opening spell of splendid bowling by Indian bowlers Ravi Kumar and Bawa, who ran through the English top order to reduce them to a precarious position of 91/7 and 24.3 overs. Ravi Kumar returned with figures of 9-1-34-4 whereas Bawa took 5/31 from his 9.5 overs which also included a maiden.
For England, James New scored a splendid 95 from 116 balls with the help of 12 boundaries to wage a lone battle with the bat as the others kept falling around him without making an impact. George Thomas, the English opening batsman, earlier scored 27 from 30 balls with 1 six and 4 boundaries at the top, but the rest of the batsmen disappointed.
Out of the top six England batsmen, only, and you got into double digits as Jacob Bethell was dismissed for 2, England captain Tom Prest was dismissed for a four-ball duck, William Luxton made 4 whereas George Bell fell for a first-ball duck.
The winning side in the final, India used as many as seven different bowling options to ensure that England did not get away after making early inroads. Apart from Ravi Kumar and Bawa, Kaushal Tambe took 1/29 from his 5 overs to join the others in the wickets column.
James Sales made a fine unbeaten 34 from 65 balls with the help of 2 boundaries as England were bowled out for just 189 from their 44.5 overs.
In their reply, India lost opening batsman Angkrish Raghuvanshi for a two-ball duck but Harnoor Singh and Rashid, who scored 50 from 84 balls with six boundaries, got the team back on track. Yash Dhull, the Indian captain scored 17 from 32 balls with one boundary but finishing touches were provided by a pair of Sindhu and Bawa, who added 67 runs for the fifth wicket to take their side close to victory.
The winning runs for India were hit by Dinesh Bana, who remained unbeaten on 13 from only 5 balls hitting 2 sixes in the process, as India made 195/6 in 47.4 overs, winning the contest by 4 wickets.
This was a record fifth U-19 World Cup title victory for India who have previously won the tournament in 2000, 2008, 2012 and 2018.