Virat Kohli starred with the bat in India’s four-wicket victory over New Zealand in the first ODI at BCA Stadium, Vadodara on Sunday (January 11).
Invited to bat first, the Kiwis rode on half-centuries from Daryl Mitchell (84 off 71), Devon Conway (56 off 67) and Henry Nicholls (62 off 69) to post 300/8 on the board.
India’s pace trio of Mohammed Siraj, Harshit Rana and Prasidh Krishna claimed two wickets each, while wrist-spinner Kuldeep Yadav returned with one scalp.
Chasing the target, the Men in Blue lost Rohit Sharma for 26 runs, which led to Kohli’s arrival in the middle. Kohli added 118 runs for the second wicket with skipper Shubman Gill to put the hosts in driver’s seat.
While Gill fell after scoring 56 off 71 balls, Virat Kohli nearly went on to hit his 54th ODI century en route to his 77-run partnership with Shreyas Iyer (49 off 47).
Kohli was dismissed on 93 by Kyle Jamieson in the 40th over. His 91-ball knock was studded with 8 fours and 1 six. During the innings, he also scaled 28,000 runs across all formats and became the second-highest run-getter in international cricket, surpassing Sri Lankan legend Kumar Sangakkara.
After Kohli and Iyer’s dismissals in quick succession, KL Rahul (29* off 21) and Harshit Rana (29 off 23) chipped in with handy contributions to take India over the line with an over to spare.
For his masterful knock in the chase, Virat Kohli received rich praise from the cricket fraternity on social media platform X.
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