Joe Root, Eoin Morgan guide England to ODI series win over India in

Headingley
England won an ODI series against India for the first time since 2011 as Joe Root and Eoin
Morgan guided the hosts to an impressive eight-wicket win at Headingley on Tuesday.
CRICKET Updated: Jul 18, 2018 01:00 IST

Sanjjeev K Samyal
Hindustan Times, Headingley

England's Eoin Morgan celebrates after reaching a half century with Joe Root during the 3rd ODI against India
in Headingley.

To the utter disbelief of their army of supporters who had thronged

Headingley in anticipation of a grand finale, India produced a limp show on
the most important day of the limited-overs leg of their tour as they were
outperformed by England in all departments in the third and final ODI on
Tuesday.

Having conceded the psychological edge to England at Lord’s, the visitors

lost the plot in the series decider on Tuesday as the rampaging England
outplayed Virat Kohli’s men by eight wickets to clinch the ODI series 2-1.

After restricting India to a below par 256/8, Joe Root (100 no) and captain
Eoin Morgan (88 no) lead the chase with authority.

It was abject surrender as the Men in Blue put up an abysmal batting show
and were equally listless on the field. They failed to make any impact on
England with the ball and the game was over as a contest in the first 10 overs
of the second half.
India were 32/1 after the first powerplay period; England had raced to 78/2 in
10 overs.

EARLY WORK UNDONE

It undid the psychological advantage India had gained by dominating the
early exchanges as England ticked all boxes in preparation for the 2019
World Cup.

The India pace bowlers only needed to keep it tight for the spinners to try and
build pressure. But by the time the spinners got into the attack, England had
reached 74/1 in nine overs. It left them with simply too much to do. It was
pedestrian stuff from India’s new ball bowlers, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and
Hardik Pandya. There was no movement in the air and nothing off the pitch.
They were wayward as well.

It was a complete performance by England. They won the battle with

dangerman Kuldeep Yadav as well. To his luck, Root was at the crease when
he came to bowl and the England Test captain, who hit 113 at Lord’s
continued from where he had left, working around Kuldeep’s bowling. The
chinaman bowler’s first spell read 4-0-23-0 before he finished wicketless,
going for 55 runs in 10 overs.

STRONG BOWLING
England elected to bowl and their bowlers put up a strong showing to pin
down India’s powerful batting. After playing on sun-kissed grounds, India
faced tough English conditions on Tuesday. Shikhar Dhawan (44 runs), Virat
Kohli (71), Dinesh Karthik (21), Mahendra Singh Dhoni (42) and Hardik
Pandya (21) all got starts but couldn’t capitalise.
RASHID SHINES
Mark Wood and David Willey bowled well with the new ball, but the men
who made the difference were spinners Adil Rashid and Moeen Ali.

Leggie Rashid made the biggest splash. In a dream spell of 10-0-49-3, he put
England on top in the decisive game. It was his double strike in the 31st over
that knocked the wind out of India’s sails. Rashid produced the ball of the
series to knock Kohli’s off-stump, with a delivery which pitched outside leg
and turned across to the disbelief of the India captain. Raina fell on the last
ball of the over, turning a leg spinner into the hands of the leg-slip fielder.

VIRAT IN A SPIN
For Virat Kohli, it was a rare series where he failed to capitalise despite being
set in all three innings. It has been a strange series for India’s premier
batsman. He has coped well with the pace test but fallen to the spinners in all
three outings, twice to Rashid with Moeen nailing him at Lord’s. To be fair to
Kohli, he was done in by an absolute beauty on Tuesday.