Indore ODI: Rohit, Rahane, Pandya fifties help India seal series vs Australia
India's Hardik Pandya slams an Australian bowler to the fence at Indore yesterday. Pic/PTI
Three convincing victories over the world champions, sixth bilateral ODI series wins in a row, a ninth straight win in the 50-over format — Virat Kohli's Team India simply cannot put a foot wrong. Some of the recent victories might have come against a deflated Sri Lankan team, but this Australian team is by no means pushovers.
India might have had the luxury of batting first on dry pitches, but in Indore they had to do it the tough way. The pitch was flat, the boundaries were small and Aaron Finch had given the visitors a perfect platform to absolutely bury the Indian bowling. But as has been the case on so many occasions in the recent past, it was the clinical death bowling by the Indian bowlers that halted the Australian charge.
With the score reading 224-2 after 38 overs, it looked certain that the visitors would add at least another 100 runs, but instead they suffered yet another batting collapse, losing lost 5-69 in the last 12.2 overs to finish with a below par 293/6 at the end of 50 overs.
Then, with the ball coming on to the bat nicely, the Australian bowlers were clueless as the opening pair of Ajinkya Rahane and Rohit Sharma hammered them across all corners of the park. Short balls were dispatched into the third tier of the stands and anything marginally outside of the line of the stumps was timed beautifully to the ropes.
Rahane and Rohit added 139 from 130 balls for the opening wicket before both fell on 70 and 71 respectively. In the past, India might have been willing to rotate the strike and grind down the target in a methodological way, but this team is different.
Hardik Pandya was promoted to No. 4 and Kedar Jadav was given the license to blast off from the first ball. Even skipper Virat Kohli tried to push the issue when there was no particular need to do so.
In the end, the strategy worked and the Indians emerged comfortable victors (294/7 off 47.5 overs) with 13 balls to spare. Pandya's promotion proved to be a masterstroke. He smashed his way to a 72-ball 78 (5x4, 4x6).
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