Carnival atmosphere as India take historic match at Lara Academy

Goldmedal T20I Cup, powered by Kent Water Purifiers

1st T20 International

Venue: Brian Lara Cricket Academy, Trinidad

Toss: West Indies won and bowled

Result: India won by 68 runs

Series: India lead five-match series 1-0

Player of the Match: Dinesh Karthik

Scoreboard: https://www.windiescricket.com/matches/211930/#scorecard

PORT-OF-SPAIN, Trinidad – The first men’s international match to be played at this scenic venue saw a colorful and vocal crowd enjoying a carnival-like atmosphere but it ended in a heavy defeat for the West Indies, on Friday.

Brian Lara himself was among the more than 12,000 fans who gathered from early to be part of history and they were treated to great entertainment and non-stop vibes even though they would be disappointed with the one-sided result.

India batted first and powered their way to 190-6 off their 20 overs before limiting the home team to 122-8 off 20 overs.

Shamarh Brooks’s top-score of 20 as West Indies losing three wickets in the power-play, and were on 73-4 at the half-way stage and failing to recover at the back end.

They were undone by India’s spinners, off-spinner Ravi Ashwin (2-22) and leg-spinner Ravi Bishnoi (2-26) making key strikes while left-arm seamer Arshdeep Singh (2-24) bowled with pace and accuracy.

India had earlier posted a very challenging target with captain Rohit Sharma top-scoring with 64 off 44 balls and Dinesh Karthik blasting 41 not out of just 19 balls. West Indies appeared to be shackling India when they restricted them to 88-3 at the half-way stage but Karthik’s fireworks saw the visitors add 102 runs from the last ten overs.

NEXT STOP, ST KITTS

The teams will now move to St Kitts for the second and third matches of the five-match rubber. The next contest will be on Monday when the west indies will look to bounce back and square the series. First ball is 10:30am (9:30am Jamaica/8pm India).