India clinched a comfortable five-wicket victory in the first of three one-day internationals against West Indies after a devastating bowling performance at the Kensington Oval in Bridgetown.
West Indies were put into bat first but were bowled out for just 114 runs after 23 overs, with India reaching the target of 115 in 22.5 overs.
It comes after India beat West Indies 1-0 in a two-Test series that ended in a washout following heavy rain.
“To be honest I never thought the pitch was going to play like that,” Indian captain Rohit Sharma said. “It was the team’s lead that we wanted to bowl first and have the score in front of us, but I never thought the pitch would deteriorate so much.
“It had everything for seamers and for spinners and the run scoring was quite difficult.
“But to restrict them to that score was a super effort from our bowling.”
Seeking to bounce back from losing the Test series, West Indies got off to a poor start, losing Kyle Mayers with just seven runs on the board.
In came Alick Athanaze, who briefly struck up a decent partnership with Brandon King on what was proving to be a tricky surface for batting.
However, both Athanaze (22) and King (17) fell within five balls of each other, taking the score to 45-3.
West Indies captain Shai Hope was next to the crease and led by example with 43 runs but was powerless to halt the Indian momentum as his team-mates came and went.
His wicket was the last meaningful domino to fall before Jayden Seales joined Ramario Shepherd and Gudakesh Motie in falling for a duck.
The 114-run total was always unlikely to be enough, but India did make hard work of the win.
King took an incredible catch to dismiss opener Shubman Gill with just 18 runs scored, but Ishan Kishan did well to make the only half-century of the match.
In the end, West Indies took an admirable five wickets but gave themselves too much work to do after their disappointing batting display.
“Too many words come to mind but let’s just say we didn’t play the way we needed to,” Hope said.
“I would say on a challenging surface like that, you’re always going to be on the back foot against India, so I would say we need to find ways to score on difficult pitches like that.”
The next one-day international takes place on July 29.
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