India went on par in the ongoing T20I series with England after a strong comeback in the second match at the Narendra Modi stadium in Ahemdabad. Debutant Ishan Kishan and Indian skipper Virat Kohli steered India’s innings while chasing the total of 165 runs set by the visitors. India hunted down the total with 13 balls to spare and levelled the five-match series 1-1.
IND vs ENG: 2nd T20I Highlights
India won the toss and Virat Kohli decided to bowl first. Bhuvneshwar Kumar got rid of dangerous Jos Buttler in the first over itself. Jason Roy (46) and David Malan (24) carried England’s innings after an early shock. Jonny Bairstow, Eoin Morgan and Ben Stokes played a small cameo of 20, 28 and 24 respectively. England racked up a decent total of 164 runs for the Indians to chase.
Ishan Kishan and KL Rahul opened the innings for India. KL Rahul went for a duck off Sam Curran. Virat Kohli (73*) and Ishan Kishan (56) carried India towards a comfortable victory. Rishabh Pant played a quick knock of 26 runs in 13 balls. Shreyas Iyer (8) was at the crease when King Kohli won it for the ‘Men in Blue’. Both the teams won batting second in the first two T20 games.
IND vs ENG: England skipper Eoin Morgan talks about the 2nd T20I match
“The pitch was slow and low and one thing that does is expose our weakness on these surfaces a little bit,” said Eoin Morgan about 2nd T20i. “We don’t play a lot on slow, low wickets, and the more we can do that, the better. You only become better in these conditions by playing in them and making mistakes.”
“You tend to learn quickly if you are winning, confident and everything rolls smoothly but equally if we have to learn the hard way we are still going through that process. We’re trying to learn the game on the game so that when it comes to the World Cup we can be best prepared and know more about ourselves.”
“The pitch in the first game really suited us – it had more pace in it and was probably similar to a Cardiff wicket – but this took us out of our comfort zone. It was a typical Indian wicket that we would play on in an IPL game. “You talk about posting a total on a wicket like that and I thought we were right in the game.”
“We did a lot of the structure of our innings really well. We established partnerships and got to the point where we tried to accelerate but managed to lose wickets at different stages. “I thought we could have been a bit more accurate in the lines and lengths that we bowled. When we went back to the basics of taking pace off the ball, we didn’t do that well enough.
“Your accuracy has to be on as you are bowling to guys on their home patch so the bowlers are up against it. India managed to get away from us quite quickly. “The advantage is always with the guys batting second but there was definitely more dew in the first game than the second so there wasn’t a complete disparity between innings.
“In the next game, because we are playing on red soil and not the black soil, there is a chance it might take more spin which probably lends itself to batting first as the wicket might get worse.”
