WELLINGTON, Feb 24: Indian batsmen�s inadequacies in adverse conditions were laid bare as they crashed to an embarrassing 10-wicket defeat against a ruthless New Zealand side that wrapped up the opening Test in just over three days here on Monday.
Starting the day on 144 for four, India were all out for 191 in 81 overs in their second innings. This was a shade better than their dismal 165 in the first innings, which eventually proved to be decisive.
Trent Boult (4/39 in 22 overs) and Tim Southee (5/61 in 21 overs), one of the finest but most under-rated new ball pairs in world cricket, showed that when it boils down to playing incisive seam and swing bowling, this batting line-up is still a work in progress.
The required target of nine runs was knocked off by New Zealand without much ado for their 100th Test win. �I think we let ourselves down massively with the bat in the first innings,� India skipper Virat Kohli said after the match.
�You could say the toss played a big role in the Test match but that�s an uncontrollable, so you can�t focus on that and take that as massive factor. But having said that, the first innings performance pushed us back,� he added.
SCORECARD
India 1st Innings: 165 all out
New Zealand 1st Innings: 348
India 2nd Innings:
Prithvi Shaw c Latham b Boult 14
Mayank Agarwal c Watling b Southee 58
Cheteshwar Pujara b Boult 11
Virat Kohli c Watling b Boult 19
Ajinkya Rahane c Watling b Boult 29
Hanuma Vihari b Southee 15
Rishabh Pant c Boult b Southee 25
Ravichandran Ashwin lbw b Southee 4
Ishant Sharma lbw b de Grandhomme 12
Mohammed Shami not out 2
Jasprit Bumrah c Daryl Mitchell b Southee 0
Extras: (w-2) 2
Total: (For all out in 81 over) 191
Fall of wickets: 27-1, 78-2, 96-3, 113-4, 148-5, 148-6, 162-7, 189-8, 191-9
Bowling: Tim Southee 21-6-61-5, Trent Boult 22-8-39-4, Colin de Grandhomme 16-5-28-1, Kyle Jamieson 19-7-45-0, Ajaz Patel 3-0-18-0.
New Zealand 2nd innings:
Tom Latham not out 7
Tom Blundell not out 2
Total: (For no loss in 1.4 overs) 9
Bowling: Ishant Sharma 1-0-8-0, Jasprit Bumrah 0.4-0-1-0. � PTI
