Glorious uncertainties,
thy name ~ Cricket – and T20 brings about even sharper results !!
With 1-1 India
played England at Bristol, at the County Cricket Ground (also known as Nevil
Road) in Bristol; home ground of Gloucestershire County Cricket Club. Initially
known as Ashley Down Ground, it was bought in 1889 by W. G. Grace and has been
home to Gloucestershire ever since. It was sold to local confectionery firm J.
S. Fry & Sons and renamed Fry's Ground. The club bought the ground back in
1933 and it reverted to its original name. Bristol is a city in South West England bordering North Somerset and South Gloucestershire,
India won the toss
~ probably Virat Kohli had the toss right but reading wrong. There were 2 changes - Siddarth Kaul and Chahar both come in,
Bhuvneshwar Kumar unfit and Kuldeep Yadav dropped. Yes Kuldeep after his 5 for in the 1st
T20 – with team management opting for a pace oriented attack going by the dimensions of the ground. Both teams had won chasing, so that wass a
fairly straightforward call – winning the toss and opting to field. Indian bowling attack read : Umesh Yadav,
debutant Deepak Chahar, Siddarth Kaul, Hardik Pandya & Yuzvendra Chahal.
The English openers
made merry and by the end of 5th over, it was 51/0. Kohli brought in Hardik Pandya, - it was 4,4,6,6
and 20 in first 4 balls – England romped to
73 for 0 from their six-over
Powerplay... Their second best of all time, apparently – and things looked ominous
– England’s highest against India was very much under threat. .. .. things were
to change subtly. A long tour of England can bring contingencies, and India
responded gloriously to the first of those to maintain their clean sheet in
T20I bilateral series of three matches. Central to India's win was a man who
might yet have to play a big part in the rest of the summer: allrounder Hardik
Pandya who after such a bad first over,
ended with figures of 4 for 38. The bowlers
reduced a marauding England batting to
198 when they had looked good for 225. MS Dhoni took 5 catches and was involved in a
direct hit run out too.
That was an
excellent finish from India, just 23 runs from the last three overs to keep
England under 200. It's still a hefty chase, set up by the fireworks from Jason
Roy and Jos Buttler at the top of the order, but they fell away somewhat at the
end. India's chase was soon minus Shikhar Dhawan, very well held by Jake Ball
at short fine-leg off David Willey. Chris Jordan took an even better catch -
arguably among the best of all-time, sprinting back many yards from mid-on and
completing a diving take near the boundary off Ball - to see off KL Rahul and
make it 62 for two.
Rohit, however, was
already well on his way - and joining forces with Kohli was of course no
detriment in a stand of 89 which put India within near touching distance. Then Hardik joined centurion Rohit Sharma when India needed to
pull themselves out of a brief slowdown when the 15th and 16th over produced
seven runs and the wicket of Virat Kohli. Pandya's 33 off 14 took off any
pressure that might have been on his Mumbai Indians' team-mate as India chased
the target down with more than an over to spare. Rohit Sharma with another deft innings of
100* of mere 56 balls was the man of the match as India won another T 20
series.
India 201 for 3
(Rohit 100*, Kohli 43) beat England 198 for 9 (Roy 67, Pandya 4-38) by seven
wickets
Happy !!
Regards – S.
Sampathkumar
8th July
2018 @ 11.10 pm.
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