IND vs WI 1st T20I:Rohit-Karthik Star With The Bat, India shine at Trinidad

IND vs WI: The Indian team defeated the West Indies by a huge margin of 68 runs in the first T20 match played at the Brian Lara Stadium in Trinidad. Riding on skipper Rohit Sharma’s 64-run knock and Dinesh Karthik’s batting in the last overs, India scored 190 for six while batting first in the opening match of the 5-match T20 series. In reply, West Indies could only score 122 runs for the loss of 8 wickets in the stipulated 20 overs .For India, Arshdeep Singh, Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravi Bishnoi picked up two wickets each. Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Ravindra Jadeja managed to take one wicket each. Dinesh Karthik scored an unbeaten 41 off 19 balls and was adjudged man of the match.

Earlier, the Indian team once again took to the field with a new opening pair. Rohit Sharma opened the innings with Suryakumar Yadav (24) to give everyone a boundary. The duo added 44 runs in the first 4.4 overs to give the team a good start. When Suryakumar Yadav opened the account with a four against Obed McCoy in the opening over, rohit welcomed Holder with a six in the second over.

In the third over, Kyle Myers dropped Suryakumar’s catch on the very first ball of spinner Aqeel Hossain. Suryakumar then hit a six and a four in the over of debutant Alzarri Joseph but was caught by Holder off Hussain. He hit three fours and a six in his 16-ball innings. In the next over, Shreyas Iyer returned to the pavilion after being caught by Hossain off McCoy without opening his account. Rohit stood firm at one end but Rishabh Pant (14 runs), Hardik Pandya (one run) who was in a great rhythm from the other end, returned to the pavilion early.

Rohit completed his 27th half-century of his T20 International career and the team’s century of runs by hitting consecutive fours off the second and third balls against Joseph in the 12th over. He hit two fours against Odin Smith in the 14th over but was caught by Shimron Hetmyer off Holder’s delivery in the 15th over. Rohit hit seven fours and two sixes in his 44-ball innings, while Karthik scored 41 runs in his unbeaten innings of 19 balls with the help of four fours and two sixes.