Warm-Up Game Defeat for India

June 3, 2009

Warm-Up Game Defeat for India

India wasted the excellent start if got in the warm up match against New Zealand and ended up getting defeated by just 9 runs. Rohit Sharma was asked to open the innings and showed his class with a 36 run knock. His batting caliber could be judged when he his Iain O’Brien for 18 runs is his second over for two massive sixes and a four. Other major contributors in the Indian chase were Suresh Raina and Ravindra Jadeja scoring 45 and 41 runs respectively.

ishant sharma The blow to the Indian batting came when Kiwi captain Daniel Vettori struck twice in his first over with wickets of Indian captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Rohit Sharma. There was some joy in the Indian camp when Raina who played some excellent shots with great running between the wickets. It was surely not India’s day as they could not reach the 171 target even though Jadeja tried his best.

To everyone’s surprise, the bowler in question over his performance in the concluded IPL, Ishant Sharma showed character and took four wickets. He bowled Jesse Ryder for 2 run making sure that Ryder’s poor form from IPL continued in England too. He also dismissed the Kiwi danger man McCullum. Ishant Sharma in the later part of the Indian bowling dismissed Jacob Oram and Styris. The other wickets were taken by Pragyan Ojha and Harbhajan Singh in the form of Martin Guptill and Ross Taylor.

James Franklin scored 27 not out off 10 balls and on-course also hit RP Singh for two successive sixes which were followed by a four. This over in the end part of the Indian bowling certainly pushed the kiwi score. Though India lost the match but certainly it provided the team to make necessary changes to its tournament strategy.

MSD in a post game interview said that the last two over’s of the Indian bowling where they conceded 31 runs were the main reason for the loss. India also missed the services of ace batsmen like Yuvraj Singh and Virender Sehwag. Yuvi was down with food poisoning and Viru missed the game due to a shoulder injury, but they are expected to be fit when the tournament starts. India is now going to play Pakistan in its next warm-up match on 5th June 2009.