After the triumph in Australia, the men in blue led by its inspirational skipper Virat Kohli arrived to New Zealand in order to settle the scores against the men in black. Napier was the host to first ODI and Kane Williamson decided to bat first after winning the toss which backfired on them.
Indian bowlers looked in great form right from the word go and didn’t let a big partnership to flourish in the innings. Kane Williamson was the lone performer for the hosts as he managed to score 64 runs. Mohammed Shami, who became the fastest Indian to 100 ODI wickets in the match scalped the top order which was well supported by the spin of Yuzvendra Chahal and Kuldeep Yadav who went through a strong Kiwi middle order.
New Zealand was bundled out on 157 runs with 12 overs still left in their innings.
India’s innings halted by a bright sun
It was the 10th over of India’s chase when the play was stopped owing to a bizarre reason which has never happened in International cricket. The match was stopped for 30 minutes as the setting sun was coming in batsman’s line of sight.
Shikhar Dhawan walked down to the umpires to complain about the setting sun and they decided to stop the play which meant that the innings was reduced to 49 overs.
Usually the stadiums in the world have pitches positioned in North-South direction but the East-West facing Napier pitch led to this problem.
There have been instances when bad light, fog or rain has stopped the play but this was the first time when a bright sun became the reason for stopping the match. It has been reported that several domestic matches have also been stopped at the same venue owing to the setting sun.
“The setting sun is directly in the eyes of the batsmen. So we got to consider the safety of the players, umpires. So we have decided to suspend play until conditions improve. This is the first time in my 14 years I have seen something like this happen on a cricket field,” said umpire Shaun George.
