India vs West Indies

Since the series was decided, it was time for experimentation, especially for the Indian side, who decided to rest some of their senior players. Manoj Tiwary returned to the side after a three year hiatus, and R Ashwin took the place of Harbhajan Singh. Also making his return was Ishant Sharma at the expense of Munaf Patel. Shikhar Dhawan’s omission came as a surprise as he is not going to get too many more opportunities at this level in the near future. The hosts brought back Darren Bravo for Kirk Edwards and Anthony Martin for Devendra Bishoo.

Also Read: India Tour Of England 2011 – Complete Schedule

India won the toss again and decided to field. Praveen Kumar reeled off three successive maiden overs and accounting for Ramnaresh Sarwan, while Danza Hyatt was given a rough time by Ishant before Lendl Simmons took him for some runs. Darren Bravo and the impressive Lendl Simmons added 53 before the left hander holed out to Mishra. Samuels perished early as Simmons brought up his sixth half century in nine ODIs this summer. However, he was run out for 67 as at 103-5, it was looking like an all too familiar script for the West Indies. Pollard and Baugh batted sensibly and added 96 for the sixth wicket before the big Mumbai Indians allrounder holed out while trying to up the scoring rate. Russell was impressive again with a quick fire 25, as the Windies finished at 249-8, their highest score for the summer.

Manoj Tiwary opened with Parthiv Patel, but struggled against the new ball. Patel played another cameo before he fell to Sammy for 26. Badrinath and Kohli set about rebuilding the innings before the former was undone by good short pitched bowling by Andre Russell. Rohit Sharma looked very comfortable during his stay while Kohli, Raina and Pathan fell in quick succession. However, when he was the seventh man out for 39, giving the impressive Martin the third of his four wickets, the writing was on the wall. No heroics from the lower order this time as Russell and Martin wrapped up proceedings to give the hosts a comfortable 103 run victory.

The standard of umpiring was very ordinary to say the least, with inconsistency in wides given, not referring to the third umpire and raising the finger only to stop it halfway. That said, the outcome wouldn’t have changed as the West Indies finally got their act together to get on the board.

Tags: 4th ODI, Cricket, IND, India, ODI Match, ODI Series, Review, Virat Kohli, West Indies, WI