Concussion substitute Harshit Rana, who replaced Shivam Dube, took three crucial wickets to dislodge England’s chase in Pune on Friday.
The 15-run victory helped India clinch the five-match T20I series 3-1 with one game left. This was India’s sixth T20I series win on the trot.
Chasing 182, England began well with Ben Duckett (39 off 19) and Harry Brook (51 off 26) leading the challenge. Phil Salt and Duckett had given them a rousing start as they reached 62/1 in the Powerplay overs.
But Varun Chakravarthy (2/28) and Ravi Bishnoi (3/28) put them in trouble before Rana got into the act.
Earlier, the Indian top-order floundered once again but some breathtaking strokeplay from Hardik Pandya and Shivam Dube took India to 181/9.
Pandya had hardly made use of the opportunities in the earlier matches while Dube was making a comeback following Nitish Reddy’s injury.
This was the same venue where Pandya slipped on his follow-through and injured himself during the ODI World Cup match against Bangladesh. On Friday, coming in at No. 7, Pandya displayed his destructive self hitting four boundaries and an equal number of sixes during his 53 off 30 balls.
Man of the Match Dube (53 off 34 balls) also didn’t do too badly in a stand of 87 off 48 balls for the sixth wicket after pacer Saqib Mahmood (3/35 in 4 overs) reduced India to 12/3 by the end of the second over.
Dube was coming back into national colours after bagging a pair in a Ranji Trophy match against Jammu and Kashmir last week.
Pandya began with an aggressive approach, then rotated the strike for a few overs before launching a brutal final assault on the English bowlers. However, his innings was cut short when he was dismissed in the 18th over.
He got an able ally in Dube, who hit seven fours and two sixes as India got as many as 109 runs in the last 10 overs.
Saqib Mahmood, playing his first game of the series, struck thrice in his first over, the second of the innings, and all three were well-planned dismissals.
Sanju Samson’s susceptibility against quick and short-pitched bowling came to the fore yet again.
Mahmood bowled one slightly back of length and the short arm pull went straight into the palms of Brydon Carse at deep fine leg boundary.
In-form Tilak Varma (0) was out first ball as he tried to use the pace and slash it over third man. The most well thought-out dismissal was certainly skipper Suryakumar Yadav’s (0), who is undergoing the worst slump in his international career.
Jos Buttler stationed a short mid-wicket fielder to exploit the Indian skipper’s
propensity to hit the flick. The ploy was executed with precision as India looked in disarray.
Abhishek Sharma (29 off 19 balls) and Rinku Singh (30 off 26 balls) tried to give the innings some respectability.
