Leeds: Skipper Virat Kohli (71, 72b, 8×4) played a strokeful innings before England dished out some disciplined bowling effort to restrict India to a modest 256 for eight in the series-deciding third and final ODI at Headingley here Tuesday.
A number of Indian batsmen got starts but failed to carry on. Shikhar Dhawan (44, 49b, 7×4), MS Dhoni (42, 66b, 4×4), Hardik Pandya (21) and Dinesh Karthik (21) got a look-in before giving it away to the England bowlers, among whom leg-spinner Adil Rashid (3/49) and pacer David Willey (3/40) excelled.
It was Rashid who really put the brakes on the Indian innings by dismissing Karthik, Kohli and Suresh Raina (1). Only some late-order resistance by Shardul Thakur (22 n o, 13b, 2×6) and Bhuvneshwar Kumar (21, 35b, 1×4) took India past the 250-run mark.
England probably will also have their work cut out if the pitch remains true to nature. There is spin and bounce on offer and both Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal can exploit it.
Put into bat, India got off to a poor start as England pacers Mark Wood (1/30) and Willey moved the new balls around under heavy cloud cover with opener Rohit Sharma (2), in particular, struggling to put bat to ball.
At 13/1 in the sixth over, Kohli joined Dhawan and the duo put on 71 runs for the second wicket to steady the ship.
However, just when they were setting up a base for India, Dhawan was run out by Ben Stokes, who broke the stumps with a direct throw after finding the opener short of the crease in the 18th over.
Karthik chugged along nicely once he came in. Scoring almost run-a-ball, he helped India cross 100 in the 20th over and put on 41 runs with Kohli for the third wicket. That budding partnership was broken when Karthik played on off Rashid in the 25th over.
It marked the onset of spin influence on this game, and six overs later came the big moment. Kohli played for a regular leg break, only the ball ripped off the surface and took his off-stump.
It was the first time in 203 ODI innings that Kohli was dismissed by a leg-spinner, who made it two wickets in six balls as Raina was caught at leg slip.
Dhoni put on 36 runs with Pandya in a bid to rebuild the innings. But just when they looked set to launch an offensive in the last 10 overs, Pandya was caught behind off Wood.