India produced an all-round performance on Sunday to take 1-0 lead against West Indies in the ongoing three-match ODI series, being played at Ahmedabad, winning the first game by a huge margin of 6 wickets. After bowling out the West Indies for a mere 176, India finished at 178/4 from their 28 overs with Rohit Sharma making a successful comeback to the side.
After India elected to field first, their fast bowlers applied a lot of pressure on the West Indies batsman who cracked and could not produce a unified batting performance. The Caribbean team’s star all-rounder and former captain Jason Holder produced a fine knock of 57, which was the only bright spot in their batting innings.
Almost all West Indies batsmen got starts but failed to convert into significant scores as Indian spinners Yuzvendra Chahal and Washington Sundar shared 7 wickets between them to wreck havoc on the Caribbean side on Sunday. Chahal returned with impressive numbers of 9.5-0-49-4 whereas Sundar was impactful as well as impressive, returning with 9-1-30-3.
Among the other bowlers, Prasidh Krishna took 2/29 from his 10 overs accounting for the likes of Holder and Akeal Hosein, whereas Mohammad Siraj bagged one wicket in the form of inform West Indies opening batsman Shai Hope, who was dismissed for 8.
After Hope chopped one onto his wickets, West Indies kept losing wickets at regular intervals to be bowled out for a small total. The opening batsman Brandon King made 13 from 26 balls, Darren Bravo scored 18 from 34 balls, Sharmarh Brooks made a 26-ball 12 whereas the explosive Nicolas Pooran hit 3 boundaries in his innings of 18 from 25 balls.
The West Indies were reduced to a precarious position of 79/7 by the end of the 23rd over but an impressive 78-run stand for the eighth wicket between Holder and Fabian Allen took West Indies past the 150-run mark. Holder made 57 from 71 balls with the help of 4 sixes whereas Alan scored 29 from as many as 43 balls while hitting 2 boundaries in the process.
Indian captain Rohit Sharma partnered with Ishan Kishan at the top as the two batsmen added 84 runs from 13.1 overs to set their team on track for a big victory. However, Virat Kohli (8) was bounced out by West Indies fast bowler Alzarri Joseph, who had accounted for Rohit earlier.
Joseph caused a mini collapse in the Indian rank when he got a part of his boot on the ball after Suryakumar Yadav and hit a straight drive. It resulted in the dismissal of Rishabh Pant, who was beginning to look good in his innings of 11 from 9 balls in which he had already hit 2 fours.
Suryakumar Yadav remained and beaten on 34 from 36 balls with 5 boundaries and he finished the game in the company of debutant all-rounder Deepak Hooda, who did well to make 26 not out from 32 balls with a couple of boundaries, as India recorded a big victory in the 1,000th ODI.
The second match of the series will be played at the same venue on February 9.