Shikar Dhawan's 98 and Krunal's sensational fifty on debut fire India to 317/5
Pune, Mar 22: Shikhar Dhawan delivered under pressure with a solid 98 before Krunal Pandya smashed the fastest fifty by a debutant to fire India to 317 for five in the first ODI against England here on Tuesday.
After Dhawan and Virat Kohli (56 off 60) shared 105 runs for the second wicket, Krunal (58 not out off 31) and K L Rahul (62 not out off 43) sent England on a leather hunt with their unbeaten 112-run stand off 57 balls.
Dhawan hammered 11 fours and two sixes in his 106-ball knock while Krunal plundered seven fours and two maximums in his entertaining innings.
Rahul also got welcome runs after a lean run in the T20 series.
Put into bat here, Rohit Sharma (28 off 42) and Dhawan shared 64 runs for the opening wicket.
Dhawan hammered two successive fours, a square-cut and drive, in the seventh over, while Rohit struck two successive boundaries in the ninth over.
Dhawan, who has lost his place in the playing eleven for T20s, got a life' when hooked over fine-leg to get his fourth boundary.
India were placed at 64/0 after 15 overs. However, Rohit soon perished, after getting an outside edge to wicket-keeper Jos Buttler off Stokes.
Skipper Kohli joined Dhawan and the two rallied the innings.
Kohli got his first boundary, a cover drive, on the 17th ball and was in his elements as he relied on drives and pulls. Dhawan brought up his fifty, with a maximum, a slog-sweep, off 68 balls, in the 24th over, and then changed gears.
Dhawan got another life after Moeen Ali dropped a sitter at deep-mid-wicket off Adil Rashid.
Kohli and Dhawan took on Ali, as the 29th over fetched India 15 runs. Kohli, who raced to his 61st ODI fifty in 50 balls, was dismissed, after he was caught in the deep off pacer Mark Wood (2/75).
India lost their way in the middle overs before Krunal and Rahul went on the offensive. Dhawan pulled one straight to Eoin Morgan at mid-wicket to miss out on a hundred.
INJURY TO BILLINGS, MORGAN
Sam Billings went off the field after hurting his shoulder while trying to save a boundary.
There was another injury scare for England when skipper Eoin Morgan was hit on his finger.
ECB in its update said both batsmen should be able to bat.
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
