On a day when Diwali festivities rang, the Indian cricket team finished their 2023 ICC Men’s ODI World Cup league stage campaign unbeaten – nine wins from nine games, their longest-ever winning streak in the tournament.
At the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru, Shreyas Iyer and KL Rahul joined forces in the first innings with India at 200/3 and stitched together a massive 208-run stand to guide India to their second-highest total in World Cup history, 410/4.
While Iyer scored an unbeaten 128 off 94 deliveries, Rahul (102) smashed the fastest-ever World Cup century by an Indian off 62 deliveries as the men in blue dispatched everything the hapless Dutch bowlers had to offer all across the park.
It was the dominating performance with the bat that led to Rohit Sharma to use as many as nine bowlers in the second innings.
Along with the usual bowlers, Shubman Gill, Suryakumar Yadav, Virat Kohli and even Sharma came in to bowl – the latter two even picking up a wicket each – as India ran away with a 160-run win.
During the course of the nine matches, India have been virtually unchallenged, but there has been a set trend in what seems to have been the team’s game plan. At the same time, the…
Read more