4 4 6 : 95 meters Six : Video of Deepak Chahar playing Finisher Role : IND v NZ

India vs New Zealand, 3rd T20I (N), Kolkata, Nov 21 2021, New Zealand tour of India

Match Report: A brilliant cameo by Chahar has helped India get to a highly competitive total. They had a superb start as Rohit and Ishan got them off to a stunning opening partnership, and the bowling all-rounders have chipped in with useful contributions towards the end. For New Zealand, Santner was the pick of all the bowlers as he got three wickets to slow things down after the kind of start Rohit gave India. But it were the middle order batsmen who struggled to find their touch.

There was a mini batting collapse when India were reduced to 103/4, but Venkatesh Iyer and Shreyas Iyer had a decent partnership to stabalize the innings. Harshal and Chahar hit a few huge blows towards the end to get the momentum back in India’s favour, but this looks a favourable wicket for the batsmen. There’s plenty of dew as we got to see a lot of misfields, so India will have to fight this challenge in order to make it 3-0 whitewash.

Ish Sodhi: I think overall it is a pretty good wicket. There’s still a little bit of dew out there and the ball was coming on nicely in the powerplay but perhaps slowed up with the older ball, something we have to take into consideration. You have to keep drying the ball.

This time of the year is the first time I have played, so there’s a bit more dew than in the May-June period. The last couple of catches that have come my way have come straight to my head, so for the first time I tried to catch it with my hand and not my forehead, gladly it stuck.

Rishabh Pant: After the WC, everyone was thinking that in what areas we can improve. As a group we have been talking about that a lot. We had to improve in the middle overs. In those two matches, we have ticked few boxes that we spoke in the team meetings. It’s going really well for us. As a kid I always dreamt of winning matches for India in any situation.

I am ready to do whatever the team needs me to do. I am happy to finish the match for the team. I can’t be complaining (about the workload) but the team management has given me offs from the next two Test matches. Hopefully I can recover well and do well in South Africa.

Glenn Phillips: We are gonna go out there and give it our best, like we do every game. India might have won the series, but we are here to put up a show, and hopefully we’ll be able to do that. The toss is out of our control and if we end up batting again today, it will be about assessing the wicket as much as possible, the way Guptill and Mitchell have started, that has been brilliant and Chapman in the middle has been quality.

I think the best way to go about things is, come in and keep things fresh and stay positive. I try to be that batter in the middle order that can do whatever role is required, whether it is having a whack in the end, or stabilze the innings if we have a rough start.