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India manage to set Zimbabwe a target of 179 in the first T20 International (T20I) against Zimbabwe at Harare. India had gotten off to an excellent start reaching the 50-run mark in the 7th over of their innings, courtesy of some excellent batting from openers Ajinkya Rahane and Murali Vijay. Vijay was the first one to go when he was run out for a 19-ball 34. A couple of overs later, Rahane too was dismissed close to a run-a-ball 33. Zimbabwe were right back in this game now and could have sensed that they could restrict India to a low score. LIVE BLOG: INDIA vs ZIMBABWE, 1st T20I at Harare
But a small partnership between Manish Pandey and Robin Uthappa was developing but Pandey looking to clear the boundary holed out in the deep and again the momentum, which was slowly building up was gone and new batsman Kedar Jadhav, who was in good nick going into this game looked positive right from the beginning. Uthappa was going great guns at the other end and looked to make amends for his poor show in the One-Day International (ODI). Jadhav, looking to be aggressive perished after he could not clear the inner circle at point, giving Christopher Mpofu his second wicket of the match. LIVE SCORECARD: INDIA vs ZIMBABWE, 1st T20I at Harare
Stuart Binny then joined his Karnataka teammate Uthappa and the duo looked aggressive right from the outset. But Binny was dismissed off the first ball of the final over, giving Mpofu his third wicket in the process. Zimbabwe bowlers to their credit kept up the pressure at the death and struck at regular intervals to cut down India’s run rate. Zimbabwe bowled a total of 25 extras, which could turn out to be pivotal in the end.
Earlier, India had won the toss for the first time in this tour and elected to bat first. Sandeep Sharma is the only new face in the playing XI from the ODIs and this happens to be his first international appearance for India as well. For Zimbabwe Taurai Muzarabani made his debut. India go into this match already having won the earlier ODI series 3-0.
Brief Scores
India 178 for 5 in 20 Overs (Murali Vijay 34, Ajinkya Rahane33, Robin Uthappa 39* , EXTRAS 25; Chris Mpofu 3 for33 , Graeme Cremer 1 for 20) vs Zimbabwe
(Pramod Ananth is a reporter at CricketCountry. He has represented Karnataka table tennis under-15, and is a hardcore supporter of Liverpool FC. His Twitter handle is @pramz)