New Zealand Beat India In Napier ODI, Brilliant Virat Ton Goes In Vain! Skip to main content

New Zealand Beat India In Napier ODI, Brilliant Virat Ton Goes In Vain!

Image
By
Mitchell McClenaghan In Fury! 
After losing both the ODI and Test Series in South Africa Indian batsmen today in the first one-day-international (ODI) against New Zealand in Napier had a great chance to reverse their poor overseas cricket trend, but they failed miserably despite a brilliant hundred by Virat Kohli (123 in 111 balls) as New Zealand beat India by 24 runs. As is usual for Indian ovseseas cricket the Indian Tour of New Zealand started with a defeat. Again, it is more of a story of the Indian batsmen not able to negotiate short balls and bouncers with four of the top batsmen failing due to sheer pace. Even then, reduced to 129 for 4 in the 29th over chasing a daunting target of 293, Kohli and Dhoni (40 off 46 balls-the second highest individual score for India) built a fast-paced partnership bringing India within sight of victory, but a quick fall of three wickets sealed an exciting New Zealand victory. Possibly it is the same fear of the short stuff that made Indian captain MS Dhoni give New Zealand the first chance of batting on a good track after winning the toss. The contrast to Indian batting is more striking when we see that New Zealand tailenders CJ Anderson and L Ronchi put together 98 runs in just 58 balls between themselves taking New Zealand to an eventually winning total. CJ Anderson went on to take two crucial Indian wickets to prove his credentials as an emerging all-rounder. MJ McClenaghan took 4 wickets including a burst of three quick ones to take his team to a great victory.

Most of the Indian bowlers were expensive though Mohammed Shami put pressure on the hosts by taking the first two wickets pretty quick. In fact India managed to slow down New Zealand most of the times when the hosts threatened to run away with the match. However, no bowler could prevent the destructive Anderson-Ronchi duo hitting sixes and fours at will taking the score to 292/7 after fifty overs. The two Indian spinners Ashwin and Jadeja gave away more than hundred runs between themselves for just one scalp making you wonder why two spinners were actually selected for the match. The Scorecard:

New Zealand lead the five-match ODI Series 1-0 at the moment. It will take a huge effort from India to come up and fight back. Of course, there is ample time left for regrouping. After the loss MS Dhoni admitted it to be a batting failure and stressed on the need of having long partnership. Team India must also try capitalising on superlative efforts by players like Virat Kohli. It is extremely depressing that Kohli got the rare misfortune of scoring a brilliant century and his team losing which never happened in his last 12 of his 18 ODI hundreds. 

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Hi! Welcome! Please comment what you feel! 😊

Popular posts from this blog

Mitali: The Trauma of Losing a Sibling

By
Maybe I lied to her when I used to reassure her that she was going to be alright and was going to resume her life in some measure of normalcy in the future years; maybe all my gestures/expressions were false when I used to run my fingers across her forehead or embrace her on occasions when she was able to move around a bit; and maybe all my exhibitions of love care and responsibility were exposed as superficial when I failed to turn up in Delhi where she along with my mother were treated during September-October, 2022 (my mother Urmila Chakravarty was also diagnosed with dental cancer the same month the same year as she was) and when all the members of my parental family and the in-laws converged. Since that fateful day in August, 2022 when she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer to that disastrous day of March 6, 2025—the day my younger blood sister Mitali (Mainu) Chakravarty Sarma (November 2, 1963—March 6, 2025) passed away in the wee hours in a hospital in Guwahati after giving a bra...
Post a Comment
Read more

Release of Book 'Randomized: A Dozen Short Stories'!

By
The fourth collection of stories titled 'Randomized: A Dozen Short Stories' by Chinmay Chakravarty has been released on Amazon KDP just now! This collection, short stories in a lighter vein plus with mild satire like the previous collections, has been published in both the E-book and Paperback formats. The links are given below:  International: Click Here ! India: Click Here !  Other collections of short stories by the same author: The Cheerless Chauffeur and Other Tales(2021)--Notion Press. Funny and Fishy Tales(2022)--KDP. The Weirdos(2022)--Ukiyoto Publishing. All books of the author are available on Goodreads, apart from Amazon and other outlets! Have a look!
Post a Comment
Read more

Kolkata: Cancel the Commerce of the Durga Puja Carnival!

By
Yes! We ask why shouldn't the pure Commerce show of the Durga Puja Carnival in Kolkata be canceled in view of the worsening medical crisis? For how long this cruel irony of continuing the worship of the Mother Goddess and continuing to torture/kill the Mothers in human forms going to continue?  Greed, limitless greed of humans! Dear God! This time Goddess Durga came in a cradle which in itself implies ominous times, and further, the tithis from Mahasaptami onward came mixed in such a way that you get three days of worship, technically. Yet, the greedy and selfie-social-media-crazy crowds of 'devotees' were still not satiated, descending on the Puja pandals in uncontrollable hordes for as long as seven days, and to pander to their greed and to have the maximum of business, most of the Puja organizers disregarded the tithi break-up completely and have been celebrating Bijoya Dashami or the Dussehra well into Ekadashi, the eleventh day! They expect the hordes to descend tonigh...
Post a Comment
Read more