Chennai: Shikhar Dhawan smashed a career-best 92 to guide India to a thrilling six-wicket win over the West Indies in the third and final T20 International, thus completing a 3-0 clean sweep, here Sunday. Dhawan hit 10 fours and two sixes in his 62-ball innings and forged a scintillating 130-run partnership with Rishab Pant (58) for the third wicket to take India home in the last ball of the innings.
Earlier, left-handed batsman Nicholas Pooran’s quick-fire half-century powered West Indies to a competitive 181/3. Chasing the target of 182 to win, Dhawan and Rishab came together at 45/2 after India had lost skipper Rohit Sharma (4) and K L Rahul (17).
After an indifferent run in the first two matches, Dhawan found his groove early and stroked the ball fluently. Boundaries flowed from his bat as he kept the scoreboard ticking. The two were quick between the wickets and also ran twos at will.
The Indian innings started on a disappointing note for Rohit Sharma’s fans as the skipper fell after scoring a boundary, caught by his opposite number Carlos Brathwaite off Kemo Paul’s bowling. The stylish KL Rahul, who came in at the fall of his skipper’s wicket, hit four boundaries in his brief stay, before nicking one from the pacer Oshane Thomas to the wicket-keeper Denesh Ramdin.
Dhawan and Pant then joined hands and dominated the West Indies attack which seemed clueless as to how to stop the flow of runs. Both went on the rampage and none of the bowlers could provide a breakthrough.
Earlier, Pooran blasted four boundaries and as many sixes in his 25-ball unbeaten innings. His blistering 87-run unbeaten partnership in 43 balls with fellow southpaw Darren Bravo (43 off 37 balls) enabled the team move from 94 for 3 to 181 in the allotted 20 overs.
Reeling after two crushing defeats, the West Indies showed the stomach to fight as they batted with a lot more purpose here. Pooran, who has been on the fringes for a while and did well in the Caribbean Premier League (CPL), showed why he is rated highly, batting with a lot of enterprise.
Chahal, who got a lot of turn off the wicket, was the most successful Indian bowler with 2/28 from his four overs, but faced the heat towards the end when Pooran and Bravo went on the attack. Washington Sundar, who took the wicket of Denesh Ramdin (15), was the other wicket-taker. Young pacer Khaleel Ahmed had a good start to his spell but he couldn’t make much of an impression. Experienced Bhuvneshwar Kumar too remained without wickets.
Earlier, openers Shimron Hetmyer (26) and Shai Hope (24) got the visitors off to a brisk start and looked to score from the word go after captain Carlos Brathwaite won the toss and elected to bat. Hetmyer, one of the success stories of the series for the Windies, cracked the first boundary in the second over bowled by Washington Sundar. Hope too got into the act in the next over from Khaleel.
