India pacer Harshal Patel said that the dampness in the wicket made it difficult for his side to hold on to the landing area in the third and final T20I against West Indies at Eden Gardens in Kolkata on Sunday. Suryakumar Yadav's 65-run knock was backed up by a spirited bowling performance as India defeated West Indies by 17 runs in the third and final T20I. "We spoke about it after the powerplay (the line and length). The ball was holding on to the wicket and therefore we wanted to keep it a little fuller. Whenever we bowled shorter they had the time to sit back and pull it. We had the conversation that we want to bowl fuller," said Harshal Patel after the game.
"You have to have clarity on what you are going to bowl. Just focusing on the next delivery is important. There was a bit of dampness in the wicket because of the weather and it was making it difficult for us to hold on to the landing area. I don't think there was a lot of dew," he added.
With this win, India won the three-match T20I series 3-0. Earlier, the Men in Blue had defeated West Indies 3-0 in the ODI series as well.
Chasing 185, West Indies got off to the worst start possible as the visitors lost opening batter Kyle Mayers (6) on the fifth ball of the innings bowled by Deepak Chahar.
In his next over, Chahar removed Shai Hope (8) and West Indies was reduced to 26/2 in the third over. Nicholas Pooran and Rovman Powell then got together at the crease and after powerplay overs, visitors' score read 68/2.
The 47-run stand for the third wicket was broken by Harshal Patel in the seventh over as he got the better of Powell (25). Venkatesh Iyer then got among the wickets as he got the prized scalp of skipper Kieron Pollard (5), and as a result, Windies were reduced to 82/4, still needing 103 runs to win.
Pooran (61) and Romario Shephard (29) tried their best, but in the end, the task proved too much, and India registered a 17-run win.