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India will be looking to seal the series tonight at the JSCA International Stadium. Wednesday’s five-wicket win in Jaipur marked the start of a Rohit Sharma-Rahul Dravid combination, although the chase of 165 had a few nagging moments.
The hosts can take a lot of positives from the first match in Jaipur. Apart from Sharma’s stroke-filled 48 and Ravichandran Ashwin’s 2/23, Suryakumar Yadav made full use of the opportunity to bat at number three with a 40-ball 62, while Bhuvneshwar Kumar scored 2/24 in his four overs. Made a good performance.
One point where India want some further improvement is to put the finishing touches with the bat. With 23 runs needed from the last four overs, India could be expected to reach home early. But New Zealand’s quick trio of skipper Tim Southee, Trent Boult and Lockie Ferguson conceded just 13 runs in the 17th, 18th and 19th overs to take the equation to the required 10 runs in the final over. Daryl Mitchell took a four each from debutants Venkatesh Iyer and Rishabh Pant to seal the deal for India despite the former ousting the former.
Though New Zealand will be happy with the fast bowlers’ performance at the back-end, apart from knocks from Martin Guptill (70 off 42 balls) and Mark Chapman (63 off 50 balls), they realize the middle order needs to move up . After Guptill and Chapman’s 109-run partnership, the rest of the batsmen could not give the required momentum in the last five overs. This resulted in them getting 15-20 runs less overall than what was expected of them. New Zealand would also like the bowlers to have more control in the power-play.
In what could be a tremendous turnaround for India as pacer Mohammad Siraj suffered a stitch on his left arm after being hit by Mitchell Santner in the final over of the innings. It is not yet known whether Siraj is available for Friday’s match.
full squad
India: Rohit Sharma (captain), KL Rahul, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Shreyas Iyer, Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant, Ishan Kishan, Venkatesh Iyer, Yuzvendra Chahal, R Ashwin, Axar Patel, Avesh Khan, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Deepak Chahar, Harshal Patel, and Mohammad Siraj.
New Zealand: Tim Southee (captain), Todd Astle, Trent Boult, Mark Chapman, Lockie Ferguson, Martin Guptill, Adam Milne, Daryl Mitchell, Jimmy Neesham, Glenn Phillips, Rachin Ravindra, Mitchell Santner, Tim Seifert, Ish Sodhi.
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