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The Indian cricket fans got a pleasant surprise at the toss as MS Dhoni, the captain came into the middle. As a consequence, Dhoni, who gave up his captaincy after 199 matches, became the third cricketer after Ricky Ponting and Stephen Flemming to captain in 200 ODIs.
Afghanistan, who elected to bat first after winning the toss, off to a great start thanks to Mohammad Shahzad who reached the half-century mark in the ninth over off just 37 balls. While Shahzad was doing an amazing job smashing the inexperienced pace attack consisting of Siddharth Kaul, Khaleel Ahmed and Deepak Chahar, he lacked support from other batsmen.
After the introduction of the spin from both ends, Afghanistan went from 63-0 at the end of 10 overs to 82-4 after 16 overs. Shahzad was doing the bulk of the scoring while other batsmen struggled to score runs. At the end of the 22nd over, Shahzad scored 95 runs out of Afghanistan's 111 which also included 5 extras.
Soon, Shahzad reached his century, he lost his partner Gulbadin Naib with whom he managed to score 50 runs for the fifth wicket. Then came Mohammad Nabi who then led Afghanistan's batting towards the end. Even after Shahzad's dismissal, Nabi continued his good work and his 56-ball 64 took Afghanistan to 243-7 at the end of 47 overs. But with Nabi dismissal in the 48th over, Afghanistan could manage to score only 9 runs in last 3 overs and set India a target of 253.
With a target of 253 to get in 50 overs, Indian openers - KL Rahul and Ambati Rayudu - gave the perfect start to the chase as they put together a hundred partnership in 92 balls. Off the very next ball, Ambati Rayudu got to his fifty off 43 balls. Soon after his fifty, Rayudu got caught at long on.
The 110-run opening stand was broken and KL Rahul soon followed his opening partner back to the pavilion after scoring a 66-ball 60. MS Dhoni then joined Dinesh Karthik in the middle.
Dhoni got unlucky as he was incorrectly given out lbw but could not review as Rahul already used up the review. The ball tracking showed that the ball was missing the stumps. With Dinesh Karthik at the other end, Manish Pandey, who was making a comeback to the Indian side, also got out for a paltry score of 8.
As a result, India lost four wickets in less than 15 overs and are in trouble as they look to chase 253.
Here are some reactions from the Twitter fraternity.
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