India overcame a short middle-order collapse at the Eden Gardens to beat West Indies in the first T20I by six wickets. They went onto lose three quick wickets in a space of few overs to go from 95/2 to 114/4. Some very good bowling from Roston Chase accounted for a rampaging Ishan Kishan. His departure was followed by Virat Kohli whose poor form continued. Meanwhile Rishabh Pant also threw his wicket away as India stared at a tight finigh. But Suryakumar Yadav(34 off 18) kept his calm and mentored his young partner Venkatesh Iyer(24 off13) in a chase which only got tighter by the minute.
The youngster was trying to go for his shots when Yadav came running towards him, dissuading him from playing his shots. India needed 39 off 23 balls at that stage. Both the players kept knocking off for singled and waited for the opportunity which came in the over of Sheldon Cottrell as Yadav slammed him for ten runs off two balls. It released all the pressure and the hosts knocked off the winning runs with seven balls to spare.
Earlier India were off to a rolling start with openers Rohit Sharma and Ishan Kishan firing at all cylinders. Windies were left to cower for themselves as Rohit raced to 40 off just 19 balls. It almost pushed the opposition out of the game before they clawed their way in with quick wickets.
Solid bowling performance on his debut by young leg-spinner Ravi Bishnoi (2/17) helped India restrict West Indies to 157/7 despite an attacking fifty by Nicholas Pooran (61 off 43) in the first T20I of the three-match series at the Eden Gardens, here on Wednesday. Apart from Bishnoi, Harshal Patel (2/37) also bowled well to keep things in control of India.
Put in to bat first, West Indies were off to a poor start as Bhuvneshwar Kumar dismissed Brandon King to give an early breakthrough. After getting hit over cover, Bhuvneshwar Kumar pulled his length back and that resulted in the breakthrough as Suryakumar Yadav took a good catch.
However, the wicket didn’t affect West Indies batters — Kyle Mayers and Nicholas Pooran — and they did some incredible hitting to shift the momentum in the visitors’ favour. Mayers, in particular, was very aggressive and used his brute power to great effect, taking West Indies to 44/1 after six overs.
After the end of the powerplay, skipper Rohit Sharma brought Yuzvendra Chahal into the attack and he immediately produced an opportunity for India to pick a wicket but there was an error in judgment from the debutant Ravi Bishnoi at the boundary line.
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