Kolkata ODI: Kohli, Rahane guide India to 252 in 50 overs against Australia

Kohli and Rahane apart, Hardik Pandya and Bhubaneswar Kumar made fine rear guard action action scoring 20 each to add substance to Indian innings  .

Coming to bat after Rohit Sharma’s early departure in the sixth over of the day with the score board reading 19, Kohli displayed his class and guided the total to 197 before making his exit after a grueling innings.

Rahane who opened the innings with Rohit Sharma  was also going great gun before he fell victim to a run out scoring another fine half century.  The duo were also added 102 runs in 2nd wicket partnership in 111 balls.

India received an early jolt  when they lost their opener  Rohit Sharma in the first ball of the sixth over  after  Hosts’ skipper Virat Kohli called correctly and decided to  bat. Rohit , who did not look much confident from the beginning failed to connect properly a faster delivery from  N M Coulter-Nile who opened Aussi, attack along with  Pat Cummings , was caught by the owler after scoring only 7 off fourteen balls.

The  departure of Sharma  saw India captain Virat Kohli joining Ajinkya Rahane and the duo   played comfortably  and picked up the run rate collecting  ones and   twos playing playing  rival medium pacers and spinners comfortably.

When the duo looked set for a big partnership, Rahane  was run out falling victim to a misunderstanding while taking the second run   after scoring 55 and adding 102 runs to the innings in second wiket partnership with Kohli off 111 balls.. Rahane’s individual 55 included seven fours from 64 balls.

India lost another wicket soon. This time Manish Pandey cut a sorry figure as he fell to the guile of spinner Ashton Agar making only 3.

While wicket fell from one end, Kohli held on at the other  and kept score board ticking  partnering  Kedar Jadhav. The duo added 55 runs taking the total to 197 when Jadhav made his exit giving a catch to  Glenn Maxwell off Coulter-Nile in the last ball of 38th over .

Jadhav made 24 off same number of deliveries  and two fours.

India lost two quick wickets within next four  overs while Kohli who was heading for  his 31 ODI  hundred  was unlucky to miss that  as he missed the line of   Aussi pacer Coulter-Nile, the most successful Aussi Bowler today after scoring 92.  Kohli played 107 balls and hit eight tail  delectable bounderies.

The departure of  Kohli saw, M S Dhoni, the architect of  India’s victory in the first  ODI of the this series earlier in Chennai, could not live up to the expectation  and  gave a catch to Aussi captain Steeve Smith  off Ken Richardson  after scoring only 5.   

Indian tail , except Hardik Pandya and Bhubaneswar Kumar , who scored  20 runs each  to help India’s total crossing  250 mark , did not last long and the hosts were all out for 252 in the last ball of the innings.

Though none of the Australian bowlers looked  devastating ,   N M Coulter-Nile  emerged most successful with  three Indian wickets.(EOM).

(Reporting by Manik Banerjee)