New Zealand vs India 2020: ODI series defeat not something very serious to ponder about, reckons Yuzvendra Chahal

India suffered their first ODI whitewash in 31 years as New Zealand beat them by five wickets in the third ODI at Mount Maunganui. Despite losing the series 3-0, leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal maintained that this was not something very serious as he felt that India had pretty much dominated world cricket for the past five years in the ODI format.

“Overall, if you see it is just the fourth or fifth series loss in the last 4-5 years. The other team is also here to play. You cannot win every match. We have won one series, lost the other, so it is not something too serious to ponder over,” Chahal was quoted as saying by PTI at the post-match press conference.

A lot of judgements were made over India's new opening combination of Prithvi Shaw and Mayank Agarwal as they failed to give India solid starts in any of the three ODIs. But Chahal backed them and believed that with experience, they will come good eventually.

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India were in a tricky situation in the third ODI again as they were 62-3 and Virat Kohli had another failure with the bat. However, KL Rahul and Shreyas Iyer batted brilliantly with the former going on to bring up his fourth ODI century.

With the help of Manish Pandey's finishing, India were able to put a total of 296 on the board and Chahal believed that the middle-order stepping up was a big positive for India.

"You can see the confidence in them. They are 25-26 years old and batting with maturity. They understand the situation well. It is not easy to bat in the middle overs especially when the spinners are bowling. Rahul has also batted up the order at times. So, it shows the maturity that he knows what the team needs,” Chahal asserted.