Follow UsNot many expected West Indies to give India a tough fight in the ODI series that commenced on Thursday (July 27), but things wrapped up earlier than expected in the first ODI at Kensington Oval in Barbados. The whole game lasted only 45.5 overs, with India notching up a comfortable five-wicket win with 163 balls to spare and taking a 1-0 lead in the series.
India won the toss and opted to bowl first with a fairly inexperienced pace attack. Mukesh Kumar made his ODI debut alongside Umran Malik and Shardul Thakur as the other frontline seamers. In between them, they shared an experience of only 45 ODIs. Yet, it was neither of them to take the new ball. Hardik Pandya opened the bowling duties for India.
After conceding only four from the first over, Pandya drew the first blood for India, dismissing Kyle Mayers in his second over. Mayers was out trying to up the ante too soon, shuffling away only to pull the ball straight to mid-on.
The second wicket pair of Brandon King and Alick Athanaze restored faith in West Indies’ innings. They added 38 runs between them from only 31 balls. Following the trend from the Test series, Athanaze looked solid again, hitting the first six of the game and pouncing on any awry delivery on offer. However, his innings was cut short by another fantastic fielding effort from Ravindra Jadeja.
Stationed at point, Jadeja not only blocked Athanaze’s flat cut but also caught it being airborne. Athanaze, who scored 22 off 18 balls, was Mukesh’s first ODI wicket. Four balls later, the other set batter, King was bowled by a delivery that flattened in trajectory after pitching and sneaked through his bat swing to hit the middle stump. From 7/1 in 2.4 overs, West Indies slid to 45/3 in 8.3 overs.
A brief 43-run stand between the skipper Shai Hope and the returning man, Shimron Hetmyer followed. That was the last time West Indies had any ‘hope’ in their innings which subsided with the introduction of spin in the attack.
Jadeja leaked 20 runs in his first two overs but once he got the better of Hetmyer, things went downhill for the hosts. Hetmyer (11 off 18 balls) threw his wicket away, trying to be too cute with a paddle sweep. His departure led to a collapse. West Indies, 88/3 in 15.3 overs before the southpaw’s dismissal, faltered to 114 all out in 23 overs. That is seven wickets for 26 runs in 45 deliveries.
Exposing the Caribbean batting unit on the spin front, Jadeja picked 3/37 in his six overs while Kuldeep Yadav snapped 4/6 in only three overs. The latter ran through the opposition’s lower-order after his introduction in the 19th over and was also adjudged as the player of the match.
114 is West Indies’ lowest ODI total at home against India. "Let's just say we didn't play the way we needed to. On a challenging pitch, we need to find ways to score,” said the Windies’ skipper, Hope. The captain was the highest scorer for the hosts, accruing 43 runs from 45 deliveries.
India lost five wickets in their pursuit of the underpar target. To begin with, India changed their batting order, promoting the middle and lower-order batters over Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli.
Ishan Kishan was the only batter to take advantage of this promotion, scoring 52 off 46 deliveries. Wickets kept falling from the other end as India’s highest partnership garnered only 36 runs - two less than the second highest stand for West Indies.
Shubman Gill fell for seven, Suryakumar Yadav (promoted to number three from number six as he was listed on the team sheet) scored 19 while Hardik Pandya (at number four) was out for five at the non-striker’s end. Yet, India’s run chase was never in a spot of bother with Kishan, fortunate with a few mistimed strokes falling in no man’s land, holding one end.
Surprisingly, or not, Shardul Thakur walked out to bat at number six when Kishan was holed out in the deep mid-wicket region. Thakur’s dismissal reminded the street cricket antics. Edging a delivery from Yannic Cariah to the second slip, Thakur complained to the umpire that he wasn’t ready because of some disturbance behind the sight screen. However, he was asked to walk off by the on-field umpires.
Eventually, Rohit walked out to bat at number seven and hit the winning stroke, scoring 12 not out off 19 balls with Jadeja unbeaten on 16 at the other end.