3rd ODI: Krishna, Siraj bowl India to a 96-run win and complete a 3-0 sweep

Ahmedabad, Feb. 11 (IANS): Led by three-wicket hauls from Prasidh Krishna and Mohammed Siraj, India signed off from the ODI series with a 96-run win over West Indies in the third and final match at the Narendra Modi Stadium on Friday. Chasing 266, West Indies were never in the hunt and were bowled out for 169 in 37.1 overs.

Deepak Chahar tested the opening pair of Brandon King and Shai Hope with some movement available from the pitch. He was almost successful when King top-edged the third ball of the innings but it fell between mid-on and mid-off fielders. King survived a DRS call off Chahar and ended the third over with successive boundaries.

Mohammed Siraj was the first bowler to strike, trapping Shai Hope with a sharp nip-backer to hit him flush on the back pad. Hope didn’t take the review as replays later showed the ball was missing the stumps.

In the next over, Chahar returned to take out King and Shamarh Brooks in the space of four balls. While King nicked an outswinger to first slip, Brooks sliced the ball straight to point, departing without troubling the scorers.

Darren Bravo and Nicholas Pooran amassed some boundaries but Prasidh Krishna broke the 43-run stand for the fourth wicket in the 14th over. Bravo played an expansive drive away from the body and edged to second slip. The extra bounce in the pitch helped Krishna in taking out Jason Holder as the ball hit the shoulder of the bat while defending and edge flew to slip fielder.

Two balls later, Fabian Allen fell for a golden duck, enticed in driving forward by a returning Kuldeep Yadav. But the googly took the edge behind to Rishabh Pant. Allen took the review but replays showed a spike on UltraEdge.

Yadav returned in his next over to take out captain Nicholas Pooran, who went hard on the drive and edged to slip fielder. But Odean Smith gave a stunning exhibition of his clean ball-striking, taking Yadav for fours through down the ground and extra cover. It was followed by back-to-back sixes over both sides of ‘v’.

Smith had luck on his side as Suryakumar Yadav dropped an absolute sitter at mid-off off Siraj the unlucky bowler. After hitting Yadav for another six over long-on, Smith had a streaky boundary off an outer edge off Siraj. Two balls later, Siraj ended Smith’s short-lived blitzkrieg as the right-handed batter mistimed to cover.

Alzarri Joseph and Hayden Walsh frustrated India with a 47-run stand for the ninth wicket. Siraj broke the stand with a short ball directed towards Walsh, and the left-handed batter gave a simple catch to leg gully. Krishna finished off the match as Joseph pulled and top-edge flew to deep mid-wicket.

Brief scores: India 265 all out in 50 overs (Shreyas Iyer 80, Rishabh Pant 56; Jason Holder 4/34, Alzarri Joseph 2/54) beat West Indies (Odean Smith 36, Nicholas Pooran 34; Prasidh Krishna 3/27, Mohammed Siraj 3/29) by 96 runs