India captain Virat Kohli played in style to return old favor to the West Indies after they posted a challenging total, which was tough to chase under lights in Hyderabad.
It was carnage as Shimron Hetmyer and Kieron Pollard joined forces to demolish the Indian bowling attack; the Men in Maroon posted 207/5 on the board in their 20 overs.
Kohli looked a little tired, but after he reached 20 off 20 balls, he changed his gear.
Then came the 16th over when King Kohli reminisced the Kesrick Williams’ notebook celebration. The Indian skipper baffled the Windies pacer with an outrageous six over long-on.
Williams’ attempted yorker skidded off the runway, and Kohli shotgunned the ball with his monstrous bottom hand to get the maximum results. The damage was done, and Kohli took out his notebook to tick the bowler’s name off for good. The 208-run target was chased down with eight balls to spare, and chase master Kohli ticked all the right boxes with an unbeaten 94 off 50 balls.
A captain's knock by @imVkohli as India win the 1st T20I by 6 wickets. #INDvWI #TeamIndia pic.twitter.com/osg63znNEn
— BCCI (@BCCI) December 6, 2019
During the post-match interview, when Windies skipper Kieron Pollard was asked about Kohli’s celebration, the former said: “He is an animated character, a great batsman and he continues to show the world that he is a world-class batsman. His theatrics or whatever, it comes as part and parcel of the game. Sometimes you have to be like that to pump yourself to score runs, and so I am fine with it.”
While Pollard praised his batters for putting up a good show, he seemed unhappy with his bowlers for failing to defend the 200-plus score.
“I think we batted pretty well. We scored above 200 runs which more often than not, you take that. But discipline in bowling and execution let us down tonight,” Pollard said at the post-match press conference on Friday night.
“We gave 23 extras, 14 or 15 of those wide deliveries, so when you look at that, those were extra balls and extra overs. When you give a class team like India, these many extra deliveries, you are destined for trouble. No balls are something we stress on in terms of non-negotiable, and we bowled a couple of them tonight. It’s something we need to look on,” he added.
Both sides will now face-off in the second T20I at the Greenfield Stadium in Thiruvananthapuram on Sunday (December 8).
