KL Rahul scores his ninth ODI century, takes India to strong score despite shaky start

KL Rahul on Saturday scored his ninth ODI century in just 80 balls in India’s third ODI against the West Indies in Mullanpur. Rahul has pretty much anchored most of the Indian innings as he kept losing partners at the other end. With India’s top three firing on all cylinders, this was the first time Rahul got to bat in the series and he made the most of it, apart from getting India to a strong score despite a shaky start to the innings.

Rahul got there with his third six of the innings. He also hit nine fours. The wicketkeeper-batter went on a carnage towards the end and finished unbeaten on 129 in 87 balls, the highest score of his ODI career. It was also the third highest score for India by a no.5 batsman, only behind Yuvraj Singh’s 139 against Australia in 2004 and MS Dhoni’s 134 against England in 2017. He also went past 10,000 international runs over the course of the innings, becoming the 15th Indian to get there.

The 34-year-old has reinforced his status as India’s mainstay in the middle order and a dependable crisis-man. While they made a mockery of mammoth chases in the first and second ODIs, Shubman Gill and Virat Kohli were dismissed for one and a duck respectively. Rohit Sharma first led India’s recovery along with Ruturaj Gaikwad, with the former captain scoring 92 in 85 balls and the latter scoring 57. The pair shared a partnership of 137 runs in 132 balls.

Rahul took his time to get going initially but then didn’t take too long to pick up pace. He brought up his half-century in 41 balls. He took off as India got to there tail-enders, with the last of those stands with Gurnoor Brar bringing 61 in just 26 balls. Brar scored just eight runs in it. India thus finished off with a score of 351/7. It was thus an incredible rally, with India’s score reading 28/2 in the first 10 overs.