Sarwan sees Windies into semis as England exit

Ramnaresh Sarwan and Shivnarine Chanderpaul steered the West Indies into the semi-finals of the World Twenty20 at England's expense as they beat the hosts by five wickets on the Duckworth/Lewis method in London, reports Venkat Ananth. Full Coverage

For the amount of cricket they've played against each other recently, it eventually came down to this one game between England and West Indies to decide a semi-finalist from Group E. Having won the toss at The Oval on Monday, England opted to bat, put on a decent 161/6 off 20 overs, in a rain-interrupted innings. Ravi Bopara (55 off 47) and Kevin Pietersen's blitzkrieg (31 off 19) propped them up to the total.

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In reply, West Indies chased down the 80-run target set for them under the Duckworth-Lewis method crossing it in just 8.2 overs, losing just five wickets and proceeding to the semifinals.

The West Indies innings started in a poor fashion with three quick wickets down for very little.

However Dwayne Bravo struck a quickfire 18 to bring them into the match and then old hands Ramnaresh Sarwana and Shivnarine Chanderpaul saw them through with a 37-run partnership in just three overs.

England: 161 in 20 overs (R Bopara 55, K Pietersen 31)

West Indies: 80 for 5 in 8.2 overs (C. Gayle 15, D Bravo 18, R Sarwan 19 n.o.).