‘Comprehensive victory’ : Twitter celebrates India’s thumping win over Zimbabwe in the first ODI

The India vs Zimbabwe ODI series got underway on Thursday at the Harare Sports Club, Harare. Captain KL Rahul, who was making a comeback to the cricket pitch after the Indian T20 League, won the toss and invited Regis Chakabva’s men to bat first.

Zimbabwe Openers Innocent Kaia and T Marumani walked out to the middle to set the tone for the series. For India, it was Deepak Chahar opening the bowling who was also making a return to the team after staying out of action for six months.

The Zimbabwe openers were seen struggling against the opening attack of Chahar and Mohammad Siraj. Both the openers, eventually, lost their wicket to Deepak Chahar, who was relentless. The Zimbabwe batters had no answer to Chahar’s impeccable line and length as it sparked a collapse that reduced them to 31/4.

Captain Chakabva decided to set his eye in and take his team out of trouble but didn’t find support from the other end. After the seamers, it was the turn for Axar Patel to bamboozle Zimbabwe batters who looked clueless in reading his variations. He clean-bowled Chakabva and ended his gritty knock of 35 off 51 balls.

After losing their captain on the score of 107, Zimbabwe looked like getting bowled out under 120 but the tailenders Brad Evans and Richard Ngarava had other plans. The duo were involved in a 70-run-partnership which took their team to a fighting total of 189. Axar Patel was the pick of the bowlers who scalped three wickets for 24 runs in 7.3 overs.

The Indian openers looked relaxed as they walked out to chase the target of 190. Both Shikhar Dhawan and Shubhman Gill started the innings cautiously and set their eye in. The duo gradually started playing some shots and looked completely untroubled by the Zimbabwe bowlers.

After seeing off the first few overs, Gill started to put his stupendous strokeplay and display as he began smashing the ball to all parts of the ground. While Gill played his shots, Dhawan kept on playing calmly and gradually built his innings.

They brought up the 100-run-partnership between them in the 20^th over. With the target getting closer, Indian batters launched an all-out attack and reached the target in 30.5 overs and, thereby, took a 1-0 lead in the series. Both Gill and Dhawan remained unbeaten on 81 and 82 respectively. Deepak Chahar was awarded player of the match for picking up 3/27 in his seven overs.

Here’s how Twitter reacted to India’s win: