TNI Bureau: Team India salvaged some pride as they prevented a 3-0 whitewash down under by winning the 3rd and final ODI by 13 runs. Australia clinched the Series 2-1.

Earlier, India won the toss and elected to bat first. The batsmen failed to live up to the expectations yet again by posting a below par score. They managed to score 302/5 in 50 overs. Even, that became possible due to some hard hits by Pandya and Jadeja in the dying overs.

For India, Virat Kohli (63), Hardik Pandya (92*) and Ravindra Jadeja (66*) were the top scorers. Jadeja scored his runs in just 50 balls with 5 boundaries and 3 sixes. Shubman Gill contributed 33. For Australia, Ashton Agar took 2 wickets.

Australia did not have a great start while chasing India’s 302. However, Aaron Finch continued with his great form to score 75. They were 158/5 at one stage. Glenn Maxwell yet again played an explosive innings – 59 off 38 balls with 3 boundaries and 4 sixes to bring Australia back into the game. But, his departure changed the course of the game. Bumrah took that precious wicket.

The Indian bowlers and fielders made all efforts to prevent a 3-0 whitewash and succeeded too. Australia bowled out for 289 in 49.3 overs.

The youngsters performed well for India. While Shardul Thakur took 3 wickets, debutant T Natarajan took 2 wickets. Jasprit Bumrah also took 2 wickets. Hardik Pandya was declared ‘Man of the Match’.  Steven Smith, who scored two hundreds in the series, was declared ‘Man of the Series’.

Virat Kohli became the fastest player to score 12,000 ODI runs. He took 242 innings to achieve the milestone. The previous record was held by Sachin Tendulkar (300 innings).