The India pace attack hunts in packs. Sunday evening was just another example of how India's current fast-bowling unit is easily its best ever in 50-over cricket, as they set about defending India's modest total of 229 with gusto. After Jasprit Bumrah struck two early blows, his partner-in-crime Mohammed Shami came up with a spendid display of swing bowling to set up Ben Stokes, then castle him with an absolute peach, before cleaning up Jonny Bairstow too. Resultantly, defending champions England were tottering at 45/4 after 13 overs (at the time of writing) against hosts India in their 2023 ODI World Cup clash in Lucknow. (Match Blog | Scorecard | Full Coverage)
Shami bowled an array of unplayable deliveries to southpaw Stokes from round the wicket, which bamboozled the latter. He was beaten all ends up by the quality display of seam bowling and got desperate to attack. But the wily Shami saw him coming, and bowled an in-swinging beauty straight at his stumps to clean up the talismanic English all-rounder. You can watch the video of how Shami expertly set Stokes up and how he dismissed the southpaw, below.
Shami did not stop at that, and soon had opener Bairstow chopping on too. The 33-year-old India seamer bowled a length ball that nipped back in and found Bairstow's inside edge, which deflected onto the pads and then trickled onto the stumps. You can watch that dismissal below.
Earlier, Indian batters struggled on a tricky surface to end up with a below-par but respectable total of 229/9 at the Bharat Ratna Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Cricket Stadium. After being asked to bat to first by Jos Buttler, the Indian innings soon began to unravel. By the end of the 12th over, the hosts were three down with just 40 runs on the board.
But skipper Rohit Sharma came up with a resilient and counter-attacking knock of 87 (off 101 balls) and along with KL Rahul (39 off 58), held the innings together. Later, Suryakumar Yadav (49 off 47) provided the final flourish to take India to a decent total. England, needing a win to keep their semi-final hopes alive, were given a new lease of life by the bowlers. David Willey led the attack brilliantly, taking three for 35. Chris Woakes and Adil Rashid also grabbed two wickets each.
