London : India wins the 1st ODI by beating England by 58 runs in 32.2 overs; Man of the Match – Ketan Patel for his all round performance India England Bi-lateral series 2015 took off in style on Sunday with Mike Gating, former first class cricket player and current Managing Director of England Cricket Board inaugurating the event.
The first ODI took off at the Leamington Cricket Club grounds today. Though slightly delayed due to rain which caused the match being restricted to 36 overs the Indian team’s spirit was in no way dampened.
England won the toss and invited India to bat first. Though the English bowlers bowled really well India ensured the numbers on the scoreboard kept soaring high ending with a final score of 314 at a loss of 6 wickets. Opening batsmen Prakash and Venkatesh played well scoring 44 runs out of 32 balls and 39 runs out of 38 balls respectively.
It was Ketan Patel’s 64 out of 59 balls and Ajay Reddy’s 59 out of 32 balls that contributed majorly to the score. Later Durga Rao and Ganesh Muhudkar hitting 30 for 23 balls and 42 for 37 balls respectively taking the score to a respectable high.
Ganesh remained not out.
Though Zaffar was out scoring no runs and Sonu managed to score 8 runs out of 2 balls the score was high enough to put pressure on the English players.
P Blueitt was one of the best bowlers who gave just 69 runs in 7 overs and took 2 important Indian wickets.
Hollingworth (7 overs/47 runs/1 wicket); Nathen Foy (8overs/70runs/1wicket); Conber (5 overs/50 runs/1 wicket); Luke Sugg (4 overs/37 runs/1 wicket) tried their best to restrict the score.
The first wicket partnership of 75 runs between Prakash and Venkatesh and third wicket partnership of 93 runs between Ajay Reddy and Ketan Patel really helped the men in blue to put up a tough score for the day. India’s scoring rate was 9 runs per over.
The English batting line could not hold their positions strongly losing very early wickets. At one point the score was as abysmal as 75 runs at a loss of 3 wickets in just 9 overs with the 3rd wicket falling at 49 runs.
Nathan Foy (B1 category player) and Luke Sugg (B3) player put up tremendous efforts to win with an outstanding partnership of 172 runs. The 4th wicket fell only at 221 runs.
There was a point when the Indian side started getting nervous. But then the fielding efforts from the Indian team were so good that the English could not withstand.
Seven wickets fell very soon all of them being run outs. Ketan Patel took 2 early wickets by giving just 65 runs in 8 overs and Shekar took 1 wicket in 5 overs and 31 runs.
Ketan was declared man of the match for his all round performance.
