He shared crucial 107-run partnership with Dhoni.
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Today’s 245 for 6 was the third highest innings total behind 260/6 scored by Sri Lanka against Kenya in 2007 and 248/6 by Australia against England in 2013.
The match, the first global outing for India in United States, was in fact a competition of show of batting prowess between the two teams on a featherbed of a pitch on a small ground at Lauderhill and Dhoni’s men came second at the end.
The 24-year-old Lewis, whose only other appearance had ended with a duck in the shock defeat to Afghanistan at the World T20 this year, feasted on flawless batting conditions at the Florida venue.
The Indian team led by a spirited performance by KL Rahul nearly chased down a record total of 245 with just 8 runs required of the last over.
The highlight of Lewis’s innings was hitting five sixes off a Stuart Binny over, all of which sailed over the boundary on the back of a stiff Florida breeze. Instead, they managed just six and West Indies came home winners by a run.
However, their hopes of doing so were hampered by rain and a “technical delay” as the match was abandoned, and West Indies won the series 1-0. “The rankings say that we’re number three and the plan is for us to go out tomorrow, give another big effort for the last, go 2-0 up, win the series and move to number two in the rankings”.
Simmons and Marlon Samuels went in quick succession but West Indies kept coming hard at the Indians with Kieron Pollard and Andre Russell, each dismissed for 13 after both cleared the boundary once.
Virat Kohli is now 52 runs behind Chris Gayle’s record for most runs in a calendar year and he will be hoping to get into his groove, soon.
Andre Russell opened the bowling for West Indies and was dispatched for a six over long leg by Rohit Sharma in the third ball of the innings.
With India needing 33 from the last three, Rahul got to his century with a brilliant six and then struck a four off the very next ball.
Dhoni joined Rahul, and they took the score past 200 in the 17th over before they eventually fell just short of their target.
Fal: 1-31, 2-48, 3-137, 4-244.
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India opted to bowl and Jasprit Bumrah (2/26), Mohammed Shami (2/31), Amit Mishra (3/24) and Ravichandran Ashwin (2/11) perfectly exploited the West Indian batsmen’s loopholes as the latter struggled from the very start and even failed to play the full 20 overs.
