India beat Australia in decider to seal ODI series win – as it happened

19 Jan 202011.01 EST

India win the series 2-1

Adam Collins

That’ll do us from Bangalore. Thanks for your company throughout the series this week - a lot of fun! Be sure to join us again on the OBO tomorrow as England try and take the last few wickets down at Port Elizabeth. Goodbye for now.

Rohit wins an award. Virat wins an award. Jadeja wins an award. Everybody wins an award! Rohit is also player of the match for his 119 from 128 balls.

Aaron Finch speaks. Wicket was turning a bit when they were batting; felt they needed 300-plus. Didn’t maximise partnerships. Losing wickets at tough times. But that’s a part of learning with a relatively young batting group. A great learning curve for the team in this series. Agar bowled beautifully; big difference the line he bowled in this series - closer to the stumps. Zampa also exceptional. Bowled the part-timers to pinch some overs but it wasn’t to be.

Sorry, I’m not sure why the presentation is taking so long. But I’ll be here with you for it. We’ll hear from the captains, the players of the match/series and the other half a dozen or so awards that tend to be handed out in these ceremonies.

Ravi Shastri is on TV. Great. He immediately has a pop at the media about criticism of the strength of Australian teams they have beaten in the past. Yawn.

Meanwhile in Port Elizabeth, Joe Root is bowling out South Africa. For real. Join Tanya Aldred for the final 20 minutes of an eventful fourth afternoon there.

47.3 overs: India 289-3 (Shreyas 44, Pandey 8) Target 287. Nice shot from Pandey, driving Hazlewood straight back past his boots for four from his second ball. Hazlewood responds with a misdirected bouncer, called a wide. Two runs to get and there it is! Pandey secures the win with an emphatic slap, straight back over the bowler’s head for four. India get the job done with 15 balls to spare. Clinical.

47th over: India 280-3 (Shreyas 44, Pandey 0) Target 287. Shreyas is determined to finish this off in style, lofting a superb square drive off Starc for four to start the new over, landing inches away from the boundary. Nine to get, will he get them with three overs to spare? Nup. Six from it, leaving seven runs left for the win.

Hazlewood bowls Kohli. It was pretty clear that the captain was trying to find a route to three figures by aiming for the vacant midwicket after pinpointing it with a powerful pull earlier in the over, but this time he’s skittled. He declined the single on offer from the previous delivery, so maybe that’s a bit of cricket karma. Either way, forget about all that, another clincial and altogether matchwinning hand from the best there has ever been in the limited-overs format of the game.

46th over: India 274-3 (Shreyas 38, Pandey 0) Target 287.

45th over: India 268-2 (Kohli 84, Shreyas 37) Target 287. Shreyas clips a couple off Starc to start the new over. When Kohli gets his turn he is about to duck then elects to pull, from the duck position, upon realising it is a slower ball. Ridiculous shot. It’s only a single though, so Shreyas is back on strike and slamming Starc over midwicket for SIX! Hard and flat - bosh! And again over point to finish, inside-out for four! Whaddashot! It makes it very difficult for Kohli to get his ton but ever so likely that India will finish this in the next couple of overs. Starc: 8-0-60-0.

44th over: India 254-2 (Kohli 83, Shreyas 24) Target 287. Zampa begins his tenth over at Kohli and the Indian captain finally takes him on, leaping on a long-hop, smashing it through cover to reach the 80s. He has a ton on the shelf here, make no mistake. Cutting hard, he adds a couple more wide of the man at deep point before turning the strike back to Shreyas. I don’t expect it’ll be a good professional decision for the younger man if he takes too many runs here, which could increase the degree of difficulty on the skipper getting to 100 before this is done. Yep - that holds up: foward defence, forward defence, single to point. Clever. All told, another night where Zampa’s reputation has been enhanced, finishing with 1/44.

43rd over: India 246-2 (Kohli 76, Shreyas 23) Target 287. Hazlewood to Kohli, but what they really want is the big quick at Shreyas who doesn’t have a reputation of fancying the short stuff. Sure enough, a bumper is what comes his way when getting on strike, hacked away unconvincingly over midwicket for a couple. Another short one follows, which he misses when making room outside leg stump. Hazlewood goes for the yorker next up but the No4 is well up to this task, adjusting in the crease to hammer it from middle stump out to cover for four. He makes it two in a row from a length delivery, again after backing away to make space to swing, middled over point this time for four more. 11 from the over, leaving India 41 to collect across the final 42 balls of this match and series.

42nd over: India 235-2 (Kohli 75, Shreyas 13) Target 287. A stange one to begin, Starc appealing for caught behind down the legside but a wide called by Umpire Gough. Now, there’s clearly a sound - shown later by technology to be Kohli’s thigh pad. Finch did make the review signal but after the 15 seconds had expired. Let’s pretend he did get it upstairs before the clock ran to zero. If the spike showed a touch on the pad would Australia have lost the review but won the extra run back in their column? Shreyas keeps the board moving India’s way when his turn comes, timing a full ball out of the block hole, directed too square for Labuschagne to drag it back from the rope. Very handy shot. They’re cruising to this.

41st over: India 227-2 (Kohli 73, Shreyas 8) Target 287. Agar completes his ten with a classy and tidy over, in keeping with the theme of his night. With a bit of turn, he finds Kohli’s outside edge to start before keeping the pair pinned to the crease. The West Australian finishes with 1/38 from his ten. He’s bowled really well.

40th over: India 224-2 (Kohli 71, Shreyas 7) Target 287. Starc let’s the new man Shreyas off the hook with a short ball well wide off off-stump, slapped away with ease through cover point. He’s on the money for the rest of the set but the problem tonight with the left-armer has been that one boundary ball an over - usually early on too - which has denied him the chance to build pressure. 63 needed in 60 balls.

39th over: India 219-2 (Kohli 70, Shreyas 3) Target 287. Agar returns to the attack for his ninth over and starts it with his poorest delivery of the night, giving some help-yourself stuff to Kohli halfway down the track. He’s back on his mark after that but there are no concerns here for the boys in blue.

38th over: India 212-2 (Kohli 64, Shreyas 2) Target 287. Starc on for his third spell, which in the World Cup was usually when he was able to cause the most chaos with late swing and the like. The pace is here but not quite the movement, tending to bang it in a touch short of a length rather than attacking the woodwork. He has five overs left and will probably be needed for all of those if it goes that far.

37th over: India 207-2 (Kohli 61, Shreyas 0) Target 287. Shreyas Iyer walks out at number four, his 16th ODI. There’s still a bit of work to do too, 80 needed from 78 balls at the end of the successful Zampa over. But none of this matters if Kohli still batting in over 45 or something like that. The window is ajar but won’t be for long.

Talk about earning a wicket. Zampa has bowled so well and now he has Rohit’s scalp, miscuing a slog sweep, the leading edge taken by Starc in from long-off. The end of another wonderful hand from the Hitman. Matchwinning, surely.

36th over: India 205-1 (Rohit 119, Kohli 59) Target 287. Here he goes! Kohli to 50 with a boundary, pulling a short ball through midwicket with complete control. Here’s a ridiculous stat: it is the 100th time he has made it to 50 in ODIs. He backs it up with the shot of the night, an on-drive to die four. Nobody is stopping that. Finch swings the changes as best he can but with 13 from the over, that’s surely game over with drinks on the field and the RCB chant going around Chinnaswamy.

35th over: India 192-1 (Rohit 118, Kohli 48) Target 287. Zampa into his eighth over - can he force a twist in this chase? He’s certainly bowling well enough, his accuracy now better than ever with a wrong’un good enough to consistently trouble Kohli, again finding his inside edge in this set. He follows it with a conventional legbreak, finding the outside edge this time. Through the stump-mic it’s clear how frustrating that is for the spinner. Kohli smiles. The required rate is 6.33.

34th over: India 188-1 (Rohit 116, Kohli 46) Target 287. It’s just not Cummins’ night, back into the attack and giving Kohli a ball to throw his hands at short and well outside the off-stump - it gets the treatment. With that in the tank, they work the singles: a pull, a flick, a steer. Harsha Bhogle hints at a very good point on the telly: why is Cummins being risked on this tour? We’re all grown-ups and we all know why this series is happening: cold, hard cash. Anyway, India need 99 to win.

33rd over: India 179-1 (Rohit 113, Kohli 40) Target 287. Zampa to Kohli. Despite the fact that India are still more than 100 runs from the finish line, this has a bit of a last-chance feel about it. So guess what? They take the foot back off, take the four singles presented to them down the ground, and leave it at that. Clinical.

32nd over: India 175-1 (Rohit 111, Kohli 38) Target 287. And now the foot goes down against Hazlewood! Rohit, clear of his century, backs himself to pick up a length delivery over long-on, going all the way for SIX. He barely swung at that - supreme timing. It’s Kohli’s turn later in the over, hooking a bouncer straight into the turf to make it a big set, 14 coming from it. In the process, the 100 partnership is raised. This is the 18th time in ODIs they’ve added three-figures together.

31st over: India 161-1 (Rohit 103, Kohli 32) Target 287. They are working this wonderfully now, picking off risk-free runs from Agar and Zampa, doing the bulk of the work when the main spinners aren’t in the attack. The required rate of 6.4 should be a doddle from here unless they lose both of these set men in a hurry.

30th over: India 156-1 (Rohit 101, Kohli 29) Target 287. But it nearly ends on 97! Hazlewood, so good earlier, is back into the attack and prompts a miscue from Rohit, only just clearing Finch at midwicket. Coming back for a couple, on 99, he steers the easiest of singles to third man to record three figures, there in 110 balls. It’s the eighth time he’s tallied three figures against Australia in 50-over cricket. Of course, the job is far from done here and the visitors throw themselves around accordingly, Smith making a brilliant diving stop at backward point to finish.

29th over: India 151-1 (Rohit 97, Kohli 28) Target 287. They can’t get Agar away so they don’t try to, happy playing him conservatively to the sweepers. Not a bad strategy given how strongly they have scored off Starc and Cummins.

28th over: India 147-1 (Rohit 94, Kohli 27) Target 287. Finch brings himself on! So, we’ve seen Labuschagne and now the skipper in terms of the part-time options. And just as it was with Marnus, it is Rohit who gets to tuck right in, lifting a half-tracker waaaaay back into the second deck for SIX to move into the 90s. Nine from the over all told. I can see what he’s thinking: with the frugality of the frontline spinners, it makes sense to get some overs from a third. But it hasn’t worked.

27th over: India 138-1 (Rohit 87, Kohli 25) Target 287. Starc is off and Agar is back, Finch sensing that they need to find a way through and his spinners are the best vehicle for that. Oooh, Kohli has hurt him first up when stopping a straight drive in his follow through. It was a good bit of fielding but the spinner keeps shaking his hand. He continues. Rohit moves to 87 later in the over, which Slater is very excited about on television. A little fact: in Test cricket, 87 is the number that Australian batsmen have been dismissed on least in the 80s. There’s another leg before appeal to finish, Agar thinking he might have The Hitman the same way he removed Rahul earlier tonight, but there’s no review forthcoming this time. Another excellent over from the left-arm tweaker; he has 1/19 from his six.

26th over: India 135-1 (Rohit 86, Kohli 23) Target 287. Zampa drops short for the first time in his spell and Rohit takes full advantage, launching him 30 rows back into the stand for SIX! Sure enough, he’s right back where he needs to be after that blip, giving up just one other single. The leggie has four left... bowl them straight?

“Scientific research might credit the pleasure we derive from elegance to geometry or genes,” writes Abhijato Sensarma on The Hitman, “but there is something too fundamentally emotional in nature about elegance to ever describe in numbers or confine to a definition. Rohit Sharma is my favourite cricketer, even when Kohli bats at the other end. Something about his batting, his leadership, and his aura energises me in a way nothing else ever has. When he is on song, he leaves me in awe; his translation of talent to success an inspiration; the front-foot pull from the willow he wields is the greatest shot in the history of the game. Cheers, Rohit, you are the best for me, and always will be.” Ahh, the passion! Go well, young man.

25th over: India 128-1 (Rohit 80, Kohli 22) Target 287. Starc is too full and too wide and Rohit is too good to miss out, hammering him out past point to start the over. He reverts to a shorter line at Kohli, beating his edge with one of those. The captain keeps the strike with a steer to third man. Good recovery from Starc.

24th over: India 122-1 (Rohit 75, Kohli 21) Target 287. Big shout... not out! Zampa went past Kohli’s blade when trying to work him through the legside. The right decision again from Finch not to send it through the DRS process - it was missing. Even so, it’s another little win for the spinner, his wrong’un working a treat. His five overs so far tonight have gone for just 19 runs. He and Agar hold the key.