India hold off West Indies by 14 runs in Indore as bowlers finally find respite
India beat West Indies by 14 runs in Indore on Sunday in the third Twenty20 International of the series, the first time until the sixth outing in a cluster of eight that a team batting first successfully defended a total. The win provided some relief to bowlers who had struggled through the white-ball tour that began in Thiruvananthapuram on September 27.
Dew has been a pronounced factor during the series, reducing spinners’ ability to grip the ball in the second half of matches. Bowlers have attempted to simulate those conditions in practice by using wet, slippery balls, but the nets lack the pressure of match play and cannot fully replicate match demands. That difference between practice and game conditions has been repeatedly cited as a reason for bowling difficulties across formats in the series.
In Indore there was no dew, which allowed reverse swing to be exploited by Arshdeep Singh, described in the report as India’s highest wicket-taker in T20Is. The dry ball also aided death bowling, with Prince Yadav and Nitish Kumar delivering pinpoint yorkers at the finish; India defended an innings total of 223 to secure the 14-run victory.
The One-Day International leg of the tour produced a high-scoring encounter in Thiruvananthapuram when John Campbell and centurion Justin Greaves put on 135 for the opening wicket in 114 deliveries. Kuldeep Yadav, operating in natural light before dew set in, finished with four for 40 to keep the West Indies’ total at 295, and India chased the target comfortably with Shubman Gill and Virat Kohli applying pressure on the bowling.
Three nights later in Guwahati West Indies amassed 405 for seven with John Campbell, Shai Hope and Amir Jangoo each recording hundreds in the same ODI innings. India produced a successful chase by eight wickets with 39 deliveries to spare, led by Shubman Gill — who, the report notes, joined his predecessor Rohit Sharma as the only batter to smack more than one ODI double-ton — and an opening partnership of 255 in 158 deliveries with Rohit Sharma.
In the New Chandigarh dead-rubber ODI Jayden Seales removed Gill and Kohli in the third over to leave India 4 for 2, but West Indies still reached 351. The report says Shai Hope, who had kept wickets for 50 wickets and suffered a groin twitch, made the most of a fortuitous promotion to opener, hobbling at times yet completing the chase with ten deliveries to spare. Two national record chases in four nights preceded the five-match T20I series.
Early matches in the T20I series also favoured bat over ball: in Lucknow West Indies were dismissed for 171 as Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav and debutant Naman Dhir shared seven wickets and India chased easily with Shreyas Iyer scoring a century. In Ranchi Sanju Samson made 82 and, with Tilak Varma and the captain, propelled India to 249 for five; Mayank Yadav removed Kamil Pooran and Shimron Hetmyer off successive deliveries and also cleaned up Rovman Powell to leave West Indies 58 for three, but Shai Hope and Sherfane Rutherford added 120 and Hope finished the chase with nine deliveries to spare.
Both after winning in Guwahati and losing in Ranchi, India head coach Gautam Gambhir called for a greater balance between bat and ball and lamented the punishment bowlers from both sides were being subjected to, while acknowledging India should have done better in Ranchi. Josh Hazlewood, speaking during IPL 2026 in April, said: “I think it’s definitely nice for the crowds to watch balls flying into the stands. From a bowler’s point of view, it almost takes the pressure off a little bit because the batsmen are expected to get off to good starts. They’re expected to score big runs, they’re expected to get 230 runs probably every T20 innings they play.” He added: “If you can get a batter on two off six balls, the pressure that they’re under in that situation is huge. You can just see a player almost melt out there in the middle, they just cannot find the gap, cannot find the boundary. I feel like that’s the biggest pressure in the game now, it almost releases the pressure (on the bowlers) a little bit.” Nitish also emphasised defensive bowling after the Indore win, and the report concludes: “But unless these ‘my batting strongest’ battles are more evenly spaced out, we are in real danger of killing the goose laying the golden eggs.”
