Bengaluru, Nov 12 : Scintillating centuries by Shreyas Iyer (128* off 94) and KL Rahul (102 off 64) helped India to post a massive 410/4 against the Netherlands at Chinnaswamy Stadium here on Sunday.
The fans had flocked to the Stadium to witness Virat Kohli (51 off 56) to get to the record-breaking 50th ODI century at his IPL home, but managed to get a well-crafted half-century instead.
However, Bengaluru boy Iyer filled the shoes of Kohli as he belted the fastest century for India in World Cups.
He reached the milestone in 62 balls, a ball less faced by Rohit Sharma.
Iyer and Rahul added 208 runs for the 4th wicket as India went about scoring 7 runs an over for the majority of their innings, before stepping up in the final Powerplay and plundering 126 runs in the final 10 overs.
Dropping their anchors, the duo laboured through in the middle overs, but cut loose in the death and accelerated the run rate even further. The 44th over became the nemesis for the Netherlands as Iyer and Rahul clobbered huge sixes.
Iyer reached his fifty with a classic cover drive in the 34th over and Rahul reached the milestone in the 43rd over, helping India to register a record of 5 top batsmen cracking half-centuries in an innings at the World Cup.
Iyer cracked his maiden World Cup ton in the 46th over and Rahul did so by smoking two back-to-back sixes in the final over.
Captain Rohit Sharma won the toss and elected to bat first. India teed off in their usual fashion on a good batting track.
Rohit (61 off 54) and Shubman Gill (51 off 32) smoked as many as 15 boundaries in the first Powerplay.
Gill was stunning of the two as he clobbered 4 sixes in the first 10 overs as compared to Rohit’s one. However, the skipper pounded 7 boundaries in that phase, and in the process guided India to 100 runs in the 12th over.
Gill looked ominous, but fell to a fantastic catch off Teja Nidamanuru. Virat was trying to get his feets on the ground as the Netherland bowlers were getting variations, but Rohit was in his usual flow and reached his fifty in the 14th over.
Unfortunately, he fell to Bas de Leede caught by Wesley Barresi at long-on, trying to play an ambitious shot.
This wicket fetched him his 15th scalp in the World Cup, surpassing his father Tim de Leede’s achievement.
After getting his feets in, Kohli opened up and took Netherland bowlers to cleaners and smoked some exhilarating shots including a bottom-handed six off Logan van Beek. When he appeared all set to get to his record-breaking 50th ODI ton, the star batsman was cleaned up by Roelof van der Merwe’s left-arm spin.
