By Karan Agrawal 
India registered a hard-fought win against New Zealand in their last group match of the Champions Trophy. The Rohit Sharma led side topped Group A with this win and will now take on Australia in the first semi final in Dubai on March 4. Batting first after losing the toss, India posted a challenging total of 249 runs on the board after meandering at 30/3 after the end of six overs and were helped by the fourth wicket partnership of 98 runs between Shreyas Iyer and Axar Patel, with the former scoring a well-crafted half-century under pressure. The Men In Blue were also helped by a sensible knock of run a ball 45 from all-rounder Hardik Pandya after losing their way at the back end of the innings.
The Chase
Chasing 250 runs to win, New Zealand got off to a shaky start as they lost opener Rachin Ravindra in the first power play after the left-hander tried to ramp a short ball from Hardik Pandiya over the boundary but only managed to hit it straight to Axar Patel, who took a well-judged catch. Rachin’s wicket halted the scoring rate as the duo of Kane Williamson and Will Young found it difficult to rotate the strike against the Indian spin quartered as a result pressure kept mounting on the batters which resulted in the wicket of Young which was followed by the wicket of Daryl Mitchell who also tried to hit his way out of the pressured created by the Indian spinners but only succeeded in giving his wicket away.
The Support
Mitchell’s wicket led to a procession that saw the New Zealand batters being clueless against the spin of Varun Chakrvarthy, who picked up his maiden five-wicket haul in ODIs. Varun, who received the player of the match award, credited senior players for easing his nerves before the match. “I did feel nervous in the initial stages because I’ve not played many matches for India in ODIs, so I definitely felt nervous, but as the game started progressing, I felt better. Virat was talking to me, Rohit Bhai was talking to me, Shreyas, Hardik, everyone was talking to me, they were telling me just calm down, just calm down,” said Varun. When asked about when he found out that he would be playing the match, Varun said, “I found out last night. I was definitely expecting to play for the country, and I was looking forward to it, but on the other hand, I was feeling a little nervous.”
The Plans
Talking about his bowling plans, Varun said that although the wicket wasn’t a rank turner, there was assistance for the spinners if you bowl in the right area. In the words of Varun, “It was not a rank turner, but if you bowl in the right places, it was giving certain help, and that’s what, it was not my own performance.” The leg spinner also praised other Indian bowlers for a collective effort. “The way Kuldeep bowled, Jadeja bowled, and Axar bowled, and even the pace bowlers, it was a total team effort,” he added.