Compact performance from team India helped them beat West Indies in the first T20I

Rohit Sharma was back at his favourite hunting ground for the first time as the captain of the Indian Cricket Team. After decimating West Indies in the One Day Internationals, the men in blue defeated West Indies by 6 wickets to win the first T20 International at Eden Gardens.

As expected, India started the match with five proper bowlers and Venkatesh Iyer as the all-rounder. However, captain Rohit Sharma didn’t use him for just one over, where Iyer gave away only four runs. Harshal Patel and especially Ravi Bishnoi were very impressive in the match. Bishnoi, who made his debut last night gave away just 17 runs in his four overs and picked up two important wickets of Roston Chase and Rovman Powell. Harshal Patel picked up two wickets as well giving 37 in his four. Yuzvendra Chahal, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Deepak Chahar picked one each as West Indies put up 157 on board after 20 overs.

The Indian bowlers were right on spot but they need to get better as two top quality pacers in the form of Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Shami are not part of the series. Once they make their comeback, two of the pacers will be dropped and you don’t want to be that. Team India should also try Venkatesh as a 5th bowling option in the upcoming matches as it will help him to groom himself before the T20 World Series later in the year.

It is true that Team India might just go with Hardik Pandya in the future and Jadeja will play at 7th but it is always healthy to keep your back-ups ready. Like Axar or Washington Sundar acts at certain stages.

In batting, Rohit Sharma completely took off the pressure from Ishan Kishan as the 5-times Indian T20 League winning captain scored a quick 40 from 19 runs. Ishan Kishan’s slow innings was under the scanner but these things happen at times. King Kohli’s rough patch continued while Rishabh went with just 8 runs in his column. One present and former Knight then took charge of the situation and delivered under pressure. Suryakumar Yadav scored 34 from 18 deliveries and Venkatesh Iyer scored 24 from 13 deliveries and with that India won the 1st T20I.

Ravi Bishnoi was rightfully handed over the Man of the Match prize for his brilliant spell. In the post-match conference, the leg-spinner said, “It's a dream to play for India and it felt good. I was nervous at the start but wanted to contribute for the team as we know West Indies is one of the strongest teams in T20 cricket”. He added, “I never thought about this (winning the MOM) but it's a dream come true moment for me”.

Captain Rohit Sharma was very happy with Ravi Bishnoi’s performance. In the post-match conference, the captain said, “Bishnoi is a very talented guy which is why we drafted him into the squad straightaway. We see something different in him. He's got a lot of variations and skill-set with him. He can bowl at any stage and it gives us a lot of options to rotate the other bowlers. Very happy with his first game for India and he's got a bright future and it's just about us now on how we use him”.