India level series after West Indies implode

Sat, Oct 11, '14

Chasing 264, West Indies were coasting. Dwayne Smith had gone past his highest ODI score, and his second-wicket partnership with Kieron Pollard was assuming threatening proportions. With nine wickets in hand, a long list of batsmen waiting in the dressing room, and 128 required at exactly a run a ball, this was West Indies' match to lose. They went and lost it.

It started with the wicket of Pollard, who chased a wide ball and dragged Amit Mishra onto his stumps. From that point, West Indies imploded. On a two-paced Feroz Shah Kotla pitch, India's bowlers put the brakes on the scoring, and panic took hold of the batsmen. West Indies lost their last nine wickets for 79 runs, and their last eight for 45.

In ODI cricket, six an over is usually a doddle when you have wickets in hand and not too many runs left to get. On this pitch, however, scoring quickly wasn't easy unless you had your eye in. India had discovered this to their detriment earlier in the day, both at the start and the end of their innings.