India - NZ. As it happened ....

And it rains again. Sheesh. When do we see the last of that? I mean… listen to this. Tamil Nadu has been having really heavy rains past two weeks. But the moment government declared schools shut it was quite sunny for most parts of the day. Course when it rained at nights, it rained enough to flood most of the streets of the state. That was quite sad.

Anyway, my point is, you declare schools shut it is sunny. You declare a match and chances are it will rain.

So, it did rain last evening and the match was reduced to eight overs per side. I’m just glad that some cricket took place. It would be a tragedy to have said - yeah ok. Series leveled. The third match abandoned. Let’s call it a day.

Especially since India won. Wow, what a match it was. Terrific. And we beat New Zealand. We broke that record. The record that showed that India has never beaten the Kiwis in the shortest format of the game. We beat them and won the series.

This is what happened. It rained. Yes. Enough said about that now. The match took place and the very famous couple D&L never stepped in. Each team was given 8 overs to bat. NZ won the toss and decided to bowl. When they came out to bat they had a target of 68. With a required run rate of 8.37, it was not easy. They lost two early wickets. Yeah, that’s what happens when you think the task ahead is really difficult. With the openers gone, batsmen three and four tried to step up. With just eight overs, you need to start hitting from the word go. As I said in my previous blog, no time to be on the defense because you have lost early wickets so you have to play it safe. No time to play it safe. Not the time to play silly shots either. Or to get run out for that matter. Kane Williamson did just that. Panicked.

New Zealand needed 19 runs in six deliveries. It was really not impossible. Do you remember the match India played against Zimbabwe a few eons ago? India needed 11 runs from 9 deliveries. 3 wickets in hand. It looked like a shoo-in. We still lost. I still remember bawling over it. NZ could not pull through either. And India came out as winners.

Earlier in the day, India came out to bat. They lost early wickets too. It was quite disappointing. I did not think we would bring up a good total. Sorry. But we did. Little little contributions from here and there and we brought 67 to the board. It was disciplined bowling from India that made the difference. Good that they stepped up. Bumrah’s 2/9 with Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Hardik Pandya taking one wicket each saved the day. Yup and no Duckworth or Lewis.

A small break and then India take on Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka visits us and the tournament lasts a while. It begins with test series - 3 matches. The matches are already up on our app. What are you waiting for? Plan your lineup. The sooner you do it, the better the chances of you staying on top as well.

Until then….

Indu