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West Indies wins a thriller against India to level the series

Sammy's quickfire 63 helps West Indies beat India by two wickets with three balls to spare.

Visakhapatnam: West Indies defeated India by two wickets in the second cricket one-dayer to level the series 1-1.

Sammy bats with a cool head and gets Windies their first win on the tour. Although West Indies lost wickets at regular intervals there were half centuries from K Powell, D Bravo and L Simmons.

Earlier, Virat Kohli missed out on a hundred by just one run before skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s fiery knock propelled India to a challenging 288 for seven.

Electing to bowl, the West Indies kept India under pressure for most of the time but the hosts scored 62 runs off the last five overs to steal the thunder from the Caribbeans.

Kohli showed calmness to soothe the nerves but only to fall victim to a rash pull as India were in danger after losing two wickets for 15 runs in the batting powerplay.

But once again Dhoni stood to the task with an unbeaten 51, his 50th ODI half-century, to give India a decent total to defend.

Dhoni slammed three sixes and four boundaries in his 40-ball knock in an entertaining 47-run seventh-wicket partnership with R. Ashwin.

Kohli had to step in early after fall of Rohit Sharma in the fifth over and he batted sensibly, not going for the cross batted shots, even as the other Indians fell trying to speed up the run-rate.

Kohli took the path of the singles and doubles with the occasional boundaries. He ran for 53 ones and five twos with only nine fours to inch one run shy of a third hundred here.

Rampaul sent down a bouncer, Kohli swirled his bat and Jason Holder took a low diving catch in deep fine leg.

After Rohit Sharma’s dismissal India crawled to 48/1 in the first powerplay. The West Indies clearly had an upper hand dismissing the other opener, Shikhar Dhawan, with an addition of another 48 runs.

Kohli had a stroke of luck when on 64 when skipper Bravo dropped him off his own follow through.

Suresh Raina got an easy reprieve on 13 after being dropped by Lendl Simmons in an easy catch as the Windies fielding looked ordinary.

Brief Scores:

India: 288 for 7 on 50 overs.(Virat Kohli 99, MS Dhoni 51 not out; Ravi Rampaul 4/60).

West Indies: 289 for 8 in 49.3 overs. (Darren Sammy 63, not out, Lendl Simmons 62; R Ashwin 2/37)

( Source : PTI )
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