It was another dominating display by the New Zealand batsmen as they defeated India by 5 wickets in the third and final One day international played at Mount Maunganui on Tuesday.
New Zealand captain Kane Williamson won the toss and decided to field first. It was an ideal start for the hosts as Kyle Jamieson produced a beauty to dismiss Mayank Agarwal cheaply. Virat Kohli came to the crease and never looked comfortable against Southee and Jamieson. Bennett did the job for captain dismissing Indian captain Kohli with a good catch from Jamieson. Prithvi Shaw played with positive intent taking on Hamish Bennett. At the end of 10 overs, India were 56 for 2.
After the power play overs, Prithvi Shaw looked in good form and a poor running between wickets ended Shaw innings for 40. KL Rahul was struggling as the pitch had movement. Shreyas Iyer continued his superb form in this series taking singles and hitting occasional boundaries. After the initial struggle, Rahul showed his class and made the batting look easy. Iyer and Rahul never rescued India’s innings with a solid partnership. Iyer reached his fifty off just 52 balls with a boundary off Jamieson bowling.
KL Rahul looked composed with his stroke play and made sure that India keep the scoreboard ticking. James Neesham provided the breakthrough for Kiwis dismissing Iyer for 63. Iyer and Rahul added 100 runs for the 4th wicket. Manish Pandey came to the crease and rotated the strike well. Rahul reached his fifty off 66 balls. Both batsmen hit occasional boundaries and ran brilliantly. Rahul showed his composure and kept the scoreboard ticking with Pandey against pacers and Mitchell Santer. Coming at number 5, KL Rahul showed his class and reached his century off 104 balls. After hitting a six off Bennett bowling, Rahul tried to hit another and was caught by Jamieson for well made 112. Rahul and Pandey added 107 runs for the 5th wicket. Manish Pandey was dismissed off the very next ball.
After the wicket of Shardul Thakur, Ravindra Jadeja and Navdeep Saini added 16 unbeaten runs for the 9th wicket to help India post 296 runs in 50 overs.
Chasing down 297 runs to win, it was a flying start by Martin Guptill who took on Bumrah, Shardul Thakur and Navdeep Saini. Yuzvendra Chahal was bought into the attack by Kohli in the 8th over. At the end of 10 overs, New Zealand raced to 65 for 0.
After the power play overs, KL Rahul missed a chance to run out Henry Nicholls as the stumps was broken without the ball. Guptill reached his fifty off just 29 balls. Yuzvendra Chahal troubled Guptill and then dismissed him with a beauty to get rid of Guptill. New Zealand openers added 106 runs in 16.3 overs. Kane Williamson came to the crease and looked confident with his stroke play. Chahal and Ravindra Jadeja troubled both batsmen. Nicholls also completed half-century off 72 balls. Chahal got the big wicket of Williamson which ended 53 runs for the 2nd wicket. Ross Taylor struggled against the Indian spinners, but Navdeep Saini and Shardul Thakur went for runs.
Ravindra Jadeja got the big wicket of Ross Taylor for 12 runs. In the next over, Shardul Thakur dismissed Henry Nicholls for 80 to bring back India into the match. James Neesham looked uncomfortable against Chahal and Jadeja. Latham looked edgy at the start of innings. Neesham took on Shardul Thakur which put pressure back on India. Chahal was bought back into the attack and dismissed Neesham. Neesham and Latham added 31 runs for the 5th wicket. Colin de Grandhomme who looked out of sorts with the bat played with positive intent and made the batting look easy against Shardul Thakur which shifted the momentum in favour of New Zealand. De Grandhomme made the batting look easy and reached his fifty off just 21 balls. Both added unbeaten 80 runs for the 6th wicket to help Kiwis win the match by 5 wickets with 17 balls to spare.
New Zealand 300 for 5 in 47.1 overs (Henry Nicholls 80, Martin Guptill 66, Colin de Grandhomme 58*, Yuzvendra Chahal 3/47) beat India 296 for 7 in 50 overs (KL Rahul 112, Shreyas Iyer 62, Manish Pandey 42, Hamish Bennett 4/64) by 5 wickets.
With this win, New Zealand whitewashed India by 3-0 and took the revenge of T20I loss. Ross Taylor for his 194 runs in 3 matches was awarded the man of the series. Henry Nicholls for his 80 runs was awarded the man of the series.
