India vs New Zealand 1st ODI: New Zealand stumbled as India register a comfortable win
Wristy start for New Zealand as India won the first ODI, which was a one-sided love affair for India as New Zealand were defeated on their home soil in the first ODI in Napier on Wednesday. The match was dominated by Indian bowling as New Zealand was bowled out for 157 runs in the 38th over.
The Shami Show
Although the spinners took 6 wickets together restricting New Zealand to 157 runs, it was Mohammed Shami’s two early wickets that did not allow New Zealand to change gears and put pressure on the Kiwi batting. With this Mohammed Shami became the fastest Indian bowler to take 100 wickets in One-day Internationals. Shami dismissed Martin Guptill in his first over to break the record previously held by the left armer Irfan Pathan. Shami then completely demolished the opening pair dismissing Colin Munro giving India a perfect start.
Dhawan is back
Chasing 158 in a One Day International that too in New Zealand was going to be a cakewalk as top edges were resulting in fours and of course the deep Indian batting. Keeping this in mind Shikhar played calmly without thinking much about his strike rate and completed 5000 runs in ODI cricket while Rohit had other plans and was continuously charging down the track to up the antics and was caught in slips before India could complete its half-century. Shikhar and Virat added 91 runs to the board after this to calm the Indian nerves as for the first time play for disturbed by the sunlight. Shikhar scored 75 runs off 103 balls silencing his critics in a styled manner as India chased down the target comfortably in 35th over.
Fighter Williamson
For New Zealand, the captain Kane Williamson scored a fighting half-century but was unable to take the team to a respectable total and was caught at log on. Williamson scored 64 runs off 81 balls which included 7 boundaries, highest by any batsman in the match.