India A cruise to victory in the 3rd ODI against New Zealand A

The 3rd unofficial ODI between India ‘A’ and New Zealand ‘A’ saw the Indian team record a thumping victory over the visitors at the Dr. Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy Cricket Stadium, Visakhapatnam. With the first two ODIs having been rain-affected, the third one was a cracker of a game, with Indian leg-break bowler Karn Sharma picking up 5 wickets. India ‘A’ won the match by 6 wickets to register their first win in the series.

The Visakhapatnam pitch was considerably slower on Wednesday than it usually is and was found to be of assistance to the spinners. A flummoxed Kiwi side chose to bat in spite of such conditions and the consequential avalanche of consecutive wickets was inevitable. New Zealand ‘A’ put up a meagre total of 143 runs for the Indian side to chase.

Karn Sharma, Deepak Hooda sparkle in India ‘A’ victory

Both the teams had some selection changes on offer as the hosts replaced both their pacers, Shardul Thakur and Siddarth Kaul, with local boy Mohammed Siraj and Basil Thampi, whereas the Kiwis had three changes up their sleeves. They rested all-rounder Scott Kuggeleijn, keeper Tom Blundell and paceman Matt Henry and brought Colin de Grandhomme, Tim Seifert and Seth Rance into the mix.

Batting first, New Zealand A openers perished after a short-lived session of power-hitting that included Colin Munro cracking consecutive boundaries in the third over and George Worker hitting a monstrous six over third man off Siraj. However, the dominoes began to tumble soon after Hooda picked up Worker’s wicket by getting him stumped for a personal score of 22 runs. Munro departed soon after and none of the middle-order batsmen were able to consolidate on the sluggish pitch. The only ray of hope for the New Zealand ‘A’ side was provided by a healthy partnership of 37 runs between Colin de Grandhomme and Henry Nicholls.

Karn stole the show with his exemplary bowling and scalped 5 wickets at an economy of a mere 2.75 in 8 overs. The Kiwis were unable to halt their downward spiral as they went from 134/5 to 143 all out. On their part, the Indian top-order didn’t start out too positively as the first three wickets fell with just 23 runs on the board. It was skipper, Shreyas Iyer who got a lucky break after being dropped by Glenn Phillips at short leg and then on, there was no stopping him. The skipper led from the front and scored 37 runs off 36 balls before being dismissed by Ish Sodhi.

However, the damage had already been done by Iyer and the duo of Vijay Shankar-Deepak Hooda consolidated on it to guide their team to a resounding victory, with more than half the overs of their innings remaining. While Hooda scored 35 runs, including 3 boundaries and 2 sixes, Shankar accrued 47 runs off 42 balls, aided by 7 boundaries and a lone sixer.

Brief Scores:

New Zealand A: 143 in 37.1 overs (Henry Nicholls 35; Karn Sharma 5-22)

India A: 144/4 in 24.4 overs (Vijay Shankar 47*, Shreyas Iyer 37; Ish Sodhi 2-31) by six wickets.