The second ODI in Ranchi saw the Indian squad put on an outstanding display, easily achieving the 279-run goal, tying the series at one game each. The youthful Proteas bowling attack, which appeared weak after the new ball stint, was cheered on by Ishan Kishan and Shreyas Iyer. The South African spinners were unable to respond to the 161-run stand between Kishan and Iyer for the third wicket after the early removal of Dhawan and Shubman Gill. Iyer reached the well-deserved three-figure milestone, but Kishan unluckily missed out on a stunning century by only seven runs. Iyer won the match for his unbeaten 113 run-knock, and Sanju Samson, who was still unbeaten at 30, led the team home. Shikhar Dhawan, the stand-in skipper, stunned the experts after the victory with a funny response to presenter Murali Karthik’s question on how losing the toss benefited him.
“Shikhar, you wanted to do something different and it worked perfectly well for you at toss,” Karthik asked Dhawan in the post match presentation. Dhawan replied saying, “Worked perfectly well for us, thanks to Keshav that he chose to bat. Glad that dew came in at the right time.” Both of them had a good laugh about the statement from Dhawan who credited the opponent skipper for choosing to bat. Shikhar Dhawan praised the young team for batting through the challenging phase while highlighting their game-changing partnership. He also stated that the intention was to attack during the power play and that the dew had made it much simpler to bat in the second inning on the pitch. “Ishan and Shreyas batted so well, that partnership was so nice to watch. It was coming on nicely, but it stayed low. Plan was to take on the bowlers in the first 10 overs as we knew it could get difficult in the middle overs. When the dew came, you could see that it got easier,” Dhawan added.
