India won one day series with Australia by 4-1

DAINIK NATION BUREAU

Riding on some tremendous bowling by the spinners and outstanding batting by Rohit Sharma and Ajinkya Rahane, India won the fifth and last one day by defeating Australia by seven wicket. With this victory India clinched 4-1 series and also regained No-1 ranking. Chasing 243 run to win, Rohit and rahane scored 124 run for the first wicket, which was also their third century stand in a row before the former shared a 99 run partnership with captain Virat kohli to ensure team big victory. Chasing a modest 243, India eventually got home in 42.5 overs with Manish Pandey hitting the winning four. With this victory Indian cricket team has given navtra gift to the country.

India captain Virat Kohli feels man- of-the-series Hardik Pandya has emerged as the “biggest asset” for the team after their convincing 4-1 win in the five-match series against Australia.

Kohli had special praise for all-rounder Pandya, who scored 222 runs with the bat and also picked up six wickets to emerge as the player-of-the-tournament. Hardik Pandya is the biggest asset (from the series).

Selection dilemma is always a good headache for me as a captain because its always better to have plenty to pick from and take the best 11 possible. He also praised the pace bowling duo of Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Jasprit Bumrah for their outstanding performances in the series.

Bhuvi (Bhuvneshwar) and (Jasprit) Bumrah have been outstanding for us. When Umesh (Yadav) and (Mohammad) Shami got their opportunity they were pretty good as well. And those two wristspinners (Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal) in the middle overs were too very good.

After leading the team to their sixth consecutive bilateral series victory, a satisfied Kohli said he was satisfied wit the overall performance of the team. I thought it was a really convincing series win. We’ve ticked all the boxes. We have been put under pressure, and we have come back four times to win four games. Lots of positives to come out of this series,” Kohli said at the post-match presentation ceremony here.

Asked about how difficult it is to keep the team motivated for an inconsequential game, Kohli said: “The management has played a role in that as well. I think it’s become second nature to the players (to keep themselves motivated despite already winning the series). Australia skipper Steve Smith said India were the deserving winners as they played better cricket than the visitors.

He said Australia were 50 runs short of what could have been a winning score on this wicket. Probably around a 300 wicket, I think. Finchy (Aaron Finch) and Davey (David Warner) played really well, and maybe one of our top four needed to go on and make a big score.

NOTE- with an input of PTI