IND VS WI Ist ODI
It was a heavily crowded day in Cuttack as India and West Indies are set for a battle in Cuttack. The first of the five match ODI series started of with a flyer as Sehwag won the toss and choose to field expecting the dew to come later on the day. As expected India played 3 seamers , V.Kumar, U.Yadav and V.Aaron.
West Indies Innings:
Bharat and Simmons were the openers for the West Indies. Bharat was trying to go for his shots and Simmons was just watching those shots and was in a defensive mood initially. Just as the game progressed, he started to play his natural game.It was Vinay Kumar, who provided the break through with the wicket of Bharat. And later the West Indies started to fumble as Varun Aaron and Umesh Yadav took the wickets of M. Samuels and Simmons respectively. The most relied man of West Indies Darren Bravo joined hands with D.Hyatt and steadied the innings. They played their strokes well and kept the Indian bowlers on the back foot. Sehwag rotated the Indian bowlers andthen even brought Raina into the attack. And finally break through came as Hyatt was not listening to his partner Bravo and was running. Unnecessary run out cost West Indies the total that they are looking for. When these two were batting, it was 127/3 In th 27th over and the West Indies would have been looking for a total of 250 with the lights of big hitting Pollard , Ramdin and Sammy in their arsenal. But the fumble, made things a bit easier to India. Though India was unable to get any wicket immediately, they drastically reduced the West Indies run rate. It was Raina who provided the break through in the 35th over with the wicket of the half centurion D.Bravo. Thereafter it was just the tail sweep for India as the wickets continue to fall. Pollard, Ramdin and Sammy failed to score big runs. Russel started to build an innings and then was out when he was at 22. And the last And the last didn’t score heavily and resulting in a moderate total of 212/9 at the end of their 50th over.
One would say, India were the favourites and with Sehwag in the mix one would expect India to chase this below par total in less than 40 overs.
India Innings:
India started of well with openers getting to a flying start. In particular, the flamboyant Sehwag got few runs under his belt with some blistering shots. Kemar Roach provided the much needed breakthrough and Patel was the first victim for Roach. Later in the same over, Gambhir attempted a unnecessary shot and lost his wicket. And Roach created some hope in the minds of West Indies fan and he didn’t stop with that, bowled a beauty to get rid of Kohli. India obviously started to feel the heat. Then Andre Russel was bought into the attack and he bowled stump to stump line and Sehwag who was expected to finish of the game was clean bowled. Later Raina, who was not a part of the Indian test squad , was dismissed in a soft manner. And India were 61/5, when Jadeja and Rohit Sharma started to build a partnership and to some extent steadied the ship wrecked Indian innings. At one stage, Indians were pretty comfortably placed. Jadeja, who played sensibly for 38 was again faced a soft dismissal, Leaving the tail enders with Rohit. Rohit played exceedingly well and was building his innings as well as involved in handy partnership with other players. Ashwin who was believed and seen as an all rounder failed to impress as he was run out in an unorthodox manner,as he didn’t respond to Rohits call who was running to the danger end. Later , he was involved with a safer partnership with Vinay Kumar, where both of them rotated the strikes and constructed a m uch required partnership. When India was just needing 11, Rohit Sharma lost his wicket. A well constructed half centurion, was out and hence put the pressure back on India. In the next over, Vinay Kumar was out trying to go for a shot which was unavailable at that ball. And finally U.Yadav and V.Aaron took the responsibility and finished of in style.
Thanks to the special knock by Rohit Sharma making sure that we cross the line.