When Kane Williamson announced at the toss that Trent Boult, Tim Southee, and Mitchell McClenaghan would not take field against India, the general consensus was that this was a massive blunder on New Zealand’s part. Boult, Southee, and McClenaghan were expected to be their trump cards, not only against India but throughout the tournament. The three spinners New Zealand selected — Mitchell Santner, Ish Sodhi, and Nathan McCullum — were considered, for want of a more polite term, to be “ordinary” at best. The Indian batsmen were expected to steamroll the unfancied New Zealand spinners. Full Cricket Scorecard: India vs New Zealand, ICC World T20 2016, Match 13 at Nagpur
Someone in the newsroom remarked that if Yuvraj Singh and Suresh Raina were on song, they would wreck havoc on poor Santner and Sodhi. Of course, that was assuming they even went past Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli. Someone else said that Williamson had dropped the match before it even begun. Jokes were being cracked on India finally winning a T20I against New Zealand. Full Cricket Updates: India vs New Zealand, ICC World T20 2016, Match 13 at Nagpur
How wrong we were. READ: New Zealand spinners rip India apart by 47 runs in ICC World T20 2016, Match 13 at Nagpur
Chasing 127 was never supposed to be a realistic challenge, not without Boult, Southee, and McClenaghan. Shikhar Dhawan clearly thought so. He tried to sweep McCullum to the new stadium in Nagpur. He missed. McCullum did not. India 5 for 1.
Santner, with a First-Class bowling average of 52.64, came on to bowl the third over. Rohit Sharma stepped out and tried to send him over long on. He missed. Luke Ronchi fumbled but managed to affect the stumping. India 10 for 2. READ: India vs New Zealand, ICC T20 World Cup 2016, Match 13 at Nagpur: Highlights of Black Caps’ innings
Raina came in. Three balls later he was back in the hut, using hands harder than diamond on a track with obvious bounce and turn. The catch was happily taken by Martin Guptill. India 12 for 3.
Santner had two in the over. To Yuvraj’s credit, he tried to play straight; so straight that it went back into the hands of McCullum. India 26 for 4. READ: India vs New Zealand, ICC T20 World Cup 2016, Match 13 at Nagpur: Highlights of India’s chase
Virat Kohli, hands down India’s best batsman in a pressure situation, was batting fluently. Ish Sodhi — Test bowling average of 52.81 and ODI bowling average of 46.33 — came on. Kohli tried to drive. But this was Shane Warne wearing a Sodhi mask. He got the ball to loop and spin just enough to take a feather of an edge. Kohli walked. India 39 for 5. The match, by now, is over.
After that it was one bad shot after another. Hardik Pandya played back to an arm ball and was LBW. Ravindra Jadeja used hands as hard as Raina’s and was expectedly out caught. Ravichandran Ashwin showed a bit of a mettle but even he was stumped off Sodhi. MS Dhoni waged a losing battle, and finally holed out trying to get a few runs. He top-scored with 30 and was the only Indian batsman with a three-digit strike rate. Ashish Nehra was bowled by Adam Milne, but by this point it did not matter.
(Shiamak Unwalla, a reporter with CricketCountry, is an animal lover and comic, film and TV geek. A fast bowler at heart, he enjoys watching a good, low-scoring game of cricket. His Twitter handle is @ShiamakUnwalla)
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