India 249 for 9 (Iyer 79, Axar 42, Henry 5-42) beat New Zealand 205 (Williamson 81, Varun 5-42) by 44 runs
India will now play Australia in the semi-final on Tuesday after finishing first in their group. On Wednesday, South Africa and New Zealand will return by plane to Pakistan for their semifinal match.
The new ball swung and seamed in the first innings of this traditional ODI before gradually calming down and gaining grip. Because there was no substantial dew, batting continued to get increasingly challenging. Kane Williamson’s slowest score of 80 or higher came after Shreyas Iyer’s slowest fifty.
After some luck and Williamson batted back wave after wave of assault from India’s spinners, they finally broke the dam, with Ravindra Jadeja dismissing Tom Latham leg before wicket on the reverse-sweep in the 33rd over. Out of the 30 middle overs, India bowled 29 overs of spin, totaling 37.3 for just 166 runs and nine wickets. After their spinners outperformed the opposition’s spinners by 0.7 runs per over in the first two games, this was a positive development. When the ball gripped less than it did in the second innings, it turned out that bowling first was the only reason.
With Matt Henry getting five wickets and their spinners bowling 25 overs for 128 runs and only two wickets, New Zealand mostly used seam to limit India. With the ball swinging for Kyle Jamieson and seaming for him, Henry was perfect as usual. With Virat Kohli added to Glenn Phillips’ impressive collection of catches, New Zealand quickly had India at 30 for 3.
Then, with some traditional ODI batting, Iyer and Axar Patel supported India. They didn’t play a reckless shot, yet they went 51 balls without hitting a boundary. Refusing to take any chances, Iyer moved from 12 off 29 to 27 off 35 before opening up after facing 63 balls.
Iyer eventually lost to a bouncer from Will O’Rourke in the 37th over, having taken 21 runs off 19 short or short-of-a-length deliveries. This wicket ended India’s hopes at the last minute. However, India reached a difficult total because to KL Rahul’s 23 off 29 and Hardik Pandya’s 45 runs per ball, which he scored while also refusing singles when batting with the tail.
After drawing some movement in the opening over and having Rachin Ravindra caught on the upper-cut, Hardik then showed himself to be a viable substitute for Harshit Rana with the new ball. Soon, spin was introduced, and it became clear that New Zealand was not reading Varun out of the hand. Between them, they had faced 34 balls in all T20Is and the IPL.
The first player to fail to play a wrong’un off the ground and suffer the consequences was Will Young, a crucial hitter in New Zealand’s Test thumping of India in India. Even Daryl Mitchell was at sea. Runs only came in drips, a push here, a paddle there, and the occasional loose ball after India had pinned the batsmen down and raised the asking rate to six in the twenty-third over. For how long could they stay risk-free?
It didn’t matter because Kuldeep Yadav’s flawless ball of a left-arm wristspinner not only got Mitchell leg before wicket, but it also outscored Mitchell’s inside edge by a margin that was unworthy of an international hitter. Additionally, he destroyed a review, which would later cost Michael Bracewell a reprieve.
The smoothest New Zealand batting performance was the 40-run partnership between Williamson and Latham, who provided some momentum with their inside-out chips and Latham’s sweeps. With seven wickets remaining at the 30-over point, New Zealand had reached precisely half of their goal. But shortly after, Jadeja delivered one so precisely that it pitched on and spun enough to strike the wicket, eluding Latham’s reverse-sweep from around the wicket.
The game changed now. If New Zealand were to get near, Williamson would have to carry this chase on his bat. When Varun returned, he made even that nearly impossible. After pulling Varun for a six, Phillips missed an in-drifting half-volley one ball later. Then there was a big dismissal.
Varun bowls wrong’uns with a scrambled seam and legbreaks with the seam straight and slanted to slide, according to video analysis. However, he now bowled Bracewell with a legbreak and a scrambled seam, posing a fresh problem for both batsmen and commentators. Additionally, Williamson suggested against the review since the projection indicated it hadn’t twisted back enough to be striking the stumps, perhaps due to the fact that there was only one review remaining.
Axar got the man off his bowling with the final ball of his allocation, and despite being dropped on 17 and 68, Williamson was unable to make India pay the ultimate price. At nine an over, the asking price suddenly necessitated a risk, and Williamson just ignored a straight delivery.
Varun’s other variation, a medium-pace cross-seam ball thrown at 113ks to tear off the off stump, put an end to his fight, although Mitchell Santner postponed the inevitable. He needed to finish a five-for with four balls remaining. Henry tried to hit out, but it took him two.
