Bowlers won us the game: Shikhar Dhawan

India opener Shikhar Dhawan has credited the bowlers for their win in the second ODI against New Zealand on Wednesday in Pune. The left-hander himself scored a well-paced knock of 68 runs while chasing a middling total of 231. Dinesh Karthik also assisted him with an unbeaten half-century and steered the team to an easy victory. However, Dhawan believed that half the job was done by the bowlers only in the afternoon.

After winning the toss, the Kiwis messed up their start by losing the top order for mere 58 runs. It was all downhill since then as they just concentrated on playing the full quota of overs. Bhuvneshwar Kumar bowled beautifully on a wicket which didn’t offer swing at all. He returned with the figures 3/45 and the other bowlers too picked wickets at the regular intervals to keep the visitors in check. He was awarded the Man of the match for his excellent bowling and he deserved every bit of it.

I was bit surprised when they batted first

Shikhar Dhawan was surprised with the decision of the Kiwi skipper to bat first as the dew was expected to come in the evening. “230 is not too much in these times. The bowlers bowled really well and the fielders backed them up well. The bowlers had done half the job actually for us. There was no seam movement when India bowled, that’s what I think. I guess we played their pacers better than they (played our pacers). I was a bit surprised with their decision to bat first because there could be dew in the evening usually during this time,” he told media.

The 31-year-old also admitted the wicket slowed down a bit in the second innings which made the stroke-making difficult. It was also evident with the approach of the batsmen as the run rate decreased drastically after the end of the first powerplay. “But it wasn’t a bad track to bat on even in the first innings. When we were batting we thought it slowed down a bit, the ball wasn’t coming that nicely, the way it should,” Dhawan concluded.