Vijay's Skills, Rayudu's Endurance and Pandya's Stupendous show helps India seal the series 4-1.



Winning the toss, Indian captain, Rohit Sharma chose to bat first. This decision was taken to test the Indian batting order against the swinging New Zealand bowling line up. There were three changes in the lineup with MS Dhoni coming for Dinesh Karthik, Vijay Shankar replacing Kuldeep Yadav and Shami entering the playing XI in place of Khaleel Ahmed. 


            It was a bad start as the openers Rohit Sharma and S Dhawan falling cheaply. India were 18/4 in the 10th over as Vijay Shankar stepping in to the field to bat. Both started slowly with no big shorts or a wrong one's in the middle over's. It was Vijay Shankar who started to play the shorts and Rayudu rotating the strike. But, it was a mix up between the two batsmen resulting in wicket of Vijay Shankar for 45 runs. The score was still 116/5 in 31.5 overs. K Jadhav was the next batsman having more than 19 odd overs to play. Ambati Rayudu started to score freely with runs started to come easily. He scored 90 runs off 113 balls with 8 fours and 4 sixers taking the score to 190 runs in the 44th over before he was dismissed by Matt Henry. K Jadhav was also dismissed by Matt Henry for 34 runs. Now it was Buvneshwar Kumar and  Hardik Pandya on crease with 4.2 overs remaining. Pandya's hitting show entertained the audience  and also taking the score to 250 runs. The visitors ended the innings at 252 runs in 49.5 overs giving the opponents a better total to chase.


            Colin Munro and Henry Nicolls opened the innings for the hosts, with Bhuvneshwar Kumar bowling the first over. Shami from the other end picked wickets for India in the beginning to put the black-caps under pressure. Kane Williamson with the wicket keeper T Latham put on a 67 runs partnership for the fourth wicket to help the team cross 100 runs. The New Zealand captain was dismissed for 39 runs dismissed by K Jadhav. Wickets started to fall in each interval of time taking the kiwis to 217 runs losing all the wickets in the 45th over. James Neesham was the pick of the batsmen with a score of 44 runs of 32 deliveries with 4 fours and 2 sixers. Y Chahal was the pick of the bowlers with three wickets for the side. This lead to a good victory after a stunning loss in the previous game.

Man of the Match: A Rayudu

Man of the Series: Mohammed Shami


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