Rohit and Kohli could be danger: Nick Kelly

In the second ODI at the Niranjan Shah Stadium in Rajkot on Wednesday, January 14, New Zealand batsman Nick Kelly has expressed hope that Indian mainstays Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma will not score any runs. After winning the first game of the three-match ODI series by four wickets at Vadodara on Sunday, January 11, India now leads the series 1-0.

But in the penultimate over, wicketkeeper-batter KL Rahul maintained his composure and led the home team to victory with a cool, collected 29 from 21 balls. India will try to continue on their impressive start with the series advantage, while New Zealand will be keen to recover and tie the series in Rajkot.

The dismissal of Kohli for a solid 93 caused India to momentarily lose steam in the chase.

“From the perspective of a cricket fan, it’s obviously quite exciting to get to play against some of the best in the world. However, I believe the boys out there will be ecstatic. According to NDTV Sports, Kelly told reporters, “And hopefully they don’t score too many runs.”

After India won the first ODI by four wickets in a fiercely contested match, Kelly is looking to put on a great showing. In the meantime, Washington Sundar’s injury during the Vadodara match has forced India to make a team change. Ayush Badoni has been included in the squad for the second and third ODIs as a result.

Yes, that is undoubtedly quite thrilling. A few days earlier, the game was quite tight. So, arriving here today was a fantastic thing. And a lovely practice wicket, you know. So hopefully tomorrow will be another amazing game,” Kelly remarked.

It was a cracking game, of course. It became really, really tight in the end, you know. We’ve had a lot of conversations over the past 24 to 48 hours, hopefully. “Hopefully, we can go out there tomorrow and win, making it 1-1,” he continued.

India Team:  Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill (c), Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KL Rahul (wk), Ravindra Jadeja, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Dhruv Jurel, Harshit Rana, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed Siraj, Prasidh Krishna, Arshdeep Singh, Ayush Badoni.

Squad from New Zealand:  Devon Conway, Michael Bracewell (c), Daryl Mitchell, Henry Nicholls, Will Young, Glenn Phillips, Mitchell Hay (wk), Michael Bracewell (c), Zakary Foulkes, Kristian Clarke, Kyle Jamieson, Jayden Lennox, Nick Kelly, Josh Clarkson, Adithya Ashok, Michael Rae