One of the most crucial games for India ahead of the upcoming 50 over World Cup happened in New Zealand today. This was an outright result in favour of the host nation, New Zealand, who were absolutely untouchable with bat and ball.

New Zealand batted first and they scored 333 runs in the first innings. However, it was expected that India might chase down this target comfortably, considering the strength in the batting order.

However, things went horribly wrong for India in the very first over as Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma and Shreyas Iyer got out in the first over of the second innings itself. 

India’s scorecard in the second innings was at 0-3. This is extremely pathetic in nature, and there was no way that India was coming back from this position while chasing more than 300 runs.

What followed was even more drastic as India scored against 89 runs and got all out. This would essentially mean that India lost the game by the margin of 244 runs. This is the second biggest defeat for India in the history of the ODI format, and that is a fact for the history books. 

Playing against top teams like New Zealand and Australia in their home conditions is always a tough challenge, but considering the strength of the Indian team, these challenges are expected to be overhauled. But that was not the case today, as India got absolutely battered on field.