India won over the West Indies by three runs in the first ODI to take a 1-0 lead in the three-match series on Friday, 22nd July. Invited to bat first, India posted an enormous 308 for 7 with captain Shikhar Dhawan as the top-scorer with a 99- ball 97 while Shubmam Gill made a classy 53- ball 64 in his ODI comeback before India held their nerves to pull off a thrilling three-run win over the West Indies in the series opener here.
Openers Dhawan and Gill shared a 119-run stand before the West Indies fought back to restrict India to 308 for seven wickets. The West Indies players could only score 305 for 6 in 50 overs. Shreyas Iyer also chipped in for 54 runs.
India was somewhere at a relieved side after posting a big total on the board, they would have expected to win by a more comfortable and bigger margin but they were challenged to dig deep. The Indian bowling attacks helped get the wickets and managed to see off the opposition, winning by a margin of just 3 runs.
How did the West Indies lose its 6 wickets?
Mohammed Siraj first bagged Nicholas Pooran to end his 51run long partnership with Brandon King before Yuzvendra Chahal could get the better of Rovman Powell. But two quick fifty-run partnerships – first between King and Akeal Hosein and then another between Hosein and Romario Shepherd – raised West Indies’ hopes. However, Chahal had King running out to sweeper cover before Siraj and Prasidh Krishna defended 38 off the last three overs – weathering the final charge from Hosein and Shepherd – to help India start the first of the 3 ODIs in Port of Spain with a three-run win. Mohammed Siraj defended 15 runs in the last over while Siraj snared a couple of wickets, and Shardul Thakur and Yuzvendra Chahal also plucked two wickets each.
India was set for a 350-plus score but Dhawan’s dismissal for the seventh time in the 90s led out to a middle-order collapse with the visitors reducing it to 252 for five wickets from 213 for one. Sanju Samson (12) missed a good opportunity to make an impact while Suryakumar Yadav (13) got out to a loose shot.
Deepak Hooda (27) and Axar Patel (21) took India past 300 with a stable 42-run stand for the sixth wicket. India’s top-3 batters Shikhar Dhawan, Shubhman Gill and Shreyas Iyer scored half-centuries for the 1st time in 12 months.
In the absence of several experienced players, Shikhar Dhawan led a young Indian team in the ODI series against a struggling Windies side that recently lost the three-match series to Bangladesh. The Men in Blue were high on confidence after an impressive game in white-ball matches against England. However, they would have missed the services of Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Rishabh Pant, Hardik Pandya and Jasprit Bumrah in the ODI series against the Windies.
