LAUDERHILL (FLORIDA), Aug 7: Shreyas Iyer roared back to form with a stroke-filled 64 while the spinners picked up all the 10 wickets as India recorded yet another one-sided 88-run victory over West Indies to wrap up the five-match T20 International series by a comprehensive 4-1 margin here.
It was Iyer’s half-century and useful contributions from Deepak Hooda (38 off 25 balls) and stand-in skipper Hardik Pandya’s (28 off 16 balls) cameo that propelled India to 188 for 7 in 20 overs after being put in to bat.
Then, Pandya handed the new ball to Axar Patel (3-1-15-3), who quickly removed makeshift opener Jason Holder (0), Shamarah Brooks (13) and Devon Thomas (10) with three arm balls on a track where balls stopped and gripped off the surface.
West Indies were all out for 100 runs inside 16 overs as one of the most lopsided T20I bilateral series came to an end even though India won’t be complaining having ticked most of the boxes.
Once Kuldeep Yadav (4-1-12-3) caught rival skipper Nicholas Pooran (3) plumb in-front with a flighted delivery, there was no way that the West Indies could have made a comeback on a track which wasn’t easy for batting.
It started getting slower with the passage of time and despite Shimron Hetmyer’s (56 off 35 balls) resistance, it was never going to be enough as the Caribbean batting line-up never had the wherewithal to cope with the quality of Indian spinners.
Ravi Bishnoi (2.4-0-16-4) also got into the act and snapped his share of wickets as India’s spin troika varied their lengths and pace with ease to keep the Windies batters on tenterhooks.
But the day belonged to Iyer, who was able to release the pressure piling upon him with a blistering knock as the Indian team, even without its regular top-order, scored above par on a slowish track.
Stand-in skipper Hardik Pandya played a nice little cameo to beef up the score in the end with 18 runs coming off the penultimate over bowled by Jason Holder. Due to lightning in the vicinity of the stadium, the match was halted for 15 minutes after 14.3 overs, when India were nicely placed at 135 for three.
Deepak Hooda was also impressive during his stay at the crease. The Iyer-Hooda pair added 76 runs in 7.1 overs and their partnership was nothing short of breathtaking with as many as four sixes hit between them apart from a flurry of fours. (PTI)
