India outplayed the West Indies to beat them by 88 runs in the 5th and Final Twenty/20 International to end the series with a 4-1 victory.
Both teams made four changes each but the West Indies looked like just going through the motions. Their bowlers bowled three no balls, and on more than one occasion didn’t seem interested in fielding the ball in their follow-through. Most tellingly, their attack lacked quality. There was no express pace, no point of difference and no accuracy.
With their regular openers Kyle Mayers and Brandon King rested, the West Indies’ batting order was bizarre. Jason Holder opened, the right-hand batsmen were bunched together, and left-arm, leg-spinner, Axar Patel was dominant in the powerplay.
Captain, Nicholas Pooran ended the series with 3 runs off 6 balls.
Playing their first matches of the series, leg-spinners, Kuldeep Yadav and Ravi Bishnoi had fun against the West Indies middle and lower order as West Indies slumped to 100 all out. It was the first time that spinners had taken all 10 wickets in a Men’s Twenty/20 International.
Shreyas Iyer and Deepak Hooda made batting look easy during the course of a 76-run stand in 7.2 overs when the West Indies often failed to bowl to their fields. Iyer often got width with the field up on the off side, and kept hitting over the 30-yard circle. He also played a gorgeous aerial off-drive off Odean Smith for his second consecutive six in the eighth over.
He was only to be outdone by Hooda who drove leg-spinner Hayden Walsh inside-out, into the wind and over extra-cover for India’s third straight six.
From 95-1 in 10 overs, Iyer and Hooda took 17 runs off the 11th over, bowled by left-arm, fast bowler, Obed McCoy who took six wickets in the second match.
Walsh and Smith made a good comeback in the second half of the innings, which was interrupted for a while with the lightning-threat alarm going off. Under the Florida state laws, no sporting activity can go ahead if there is a threat of lightning in a seven-mile radius of the venue. Even the spectators had to find shelter.
Left-hander, Shimron Hetmyer made 56 off 35 balls and was the only West Indies batsman to bat with any purpose.
The final scores: India 188-7 off 20 overs, the West Indies 100 off 15.4 overs.
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