West Indies last in Ashwin’s vortex after Karthik-Storm
There has been a tea cup storm in the cricket world for a long time whether Dinesh Karthik will be in India’s T20 World Cup squad or not. After the IPL today against the West Indies, Karthik himself created a storm with the bat at the Brian Lara Stadium in Trinidad. He has won India by raising this storm, but at the same time he has made everyone understand that it is inevitable to question his place in India’s T20 team!
At the end of 16 overs of India’s innings, what no one could have imagined, Karthik’s storm made it a reality. At the end of 16 overs, India were 138 for 6. At the end of 20 overs, the face of the scoreboard changed. No more wickets fell for India. But the run was 190. It was made possible by Karthik’s unbeaten innings of 41 off 19 balls at number 7. Karthik scored this run with 4 fours and 2 sixes. Ravichandran took 52 runs with Ashwin in the last four overs.
West Indies got off to a positive start after Karthik’s storm. Two openers Samara Brooks and Kyle Meyers picked up 11 runs in the first over made by Bhuvneshwar Kumar. 11 runs came from the first three balls of Arshdeep’s second over. Despite such a start, West Indies managed to score 122 runs for 8 wickets in 20 overs. They lost the first T20 match by 68 runs.
India’s spinners contributed to West Indies getting off to a positive start but eventually lost. Rohit’s team started playing with three spinners. Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja and Ravi Vishnui – the three took 5 wickets together. Ashwin and Vishnu took 2 wickets each, Jadeja one. Of West Indies’ remaining three wickets, two were taken by Arshdeep, one by Bhuvneshwar Kumar. Brooks scored the maximum 20 runs in West Indies’ innings.