Prasidh Krishna's four-wicket haul helps India win West Indies ODI series

Fast bowler Prasidh Krishna produced career-best figures of 4-12 from nine overs as India defeated the West Indies by 44 runs in a low-scoring encounter in the second OD in Ahmedabad to take an unassailable lead in the three-match series.

Following their comfortable six-wicket win in the opening ODI at the Narendra Modi Stadium on Sunday, the hosts were given a tougher challenge as they were forced to defend a modest total of 237-9. Put into bat, Suryakumar Yadav top-scored for the hosts with 64 runs from 83 balls but a challenging surface that gave assistance to both seamers and spinners meant India struggled to get going.

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Yadav put together a 90-run stand with KL Rahul (49), which came to an end when a mix-up between the two led to Rahul being run out. For the West Indies, Alzarri Joseph and Odean Smith took two wickets apiece, with captain Kieron Pollard missing the match due to a niggle.

"There were some challenges. The partnership between Rahul and Surya had a lot of maturity," said Rohit Sharma, who oversaw his first series win as ODI captain since taking over from Virat Kohli. "We got to a respectable total in the end. We knew we could fight it out. The entire unit came out and bowled superbly."

India have made a conscious decision of having a tall bowler hit the deck in the middle overs in white-ball cricket and Krishna played that role to perfection as he extracted movement and bounce from the Motera surface.

The West Indies were jolted early in their reply after Krishna dismissed opener Brandon King and Darren Bravo in successive overs, before getting the wicket of stand-in captain Nicholas Pooran (9) in the 20th over. Shamarh Brooks (44) provided some resistance before he became Deepak Hooda's first wicket in international cricket, missing out on his fifty when he hit one to long on.

Smith then provided the West Indies a glimmer of hope towards the end with a knock of 24, which included a couple of sixes, but the West Indies were bowled out for 193 inside 46 overs.

"I have been striving hard to do this for a long time. So, I am very happy that we won. I was just looking to hit the good areas," Krishna said. "I wanted to keep it tight, keep it simple, and let the ball do the talking. I stuck to good lines and tried to be as consistent as possible." The two team meet in the third and final match of the series at the same venue on Friday.