Simmons Guide West Indies to a Comfortable Win

West Indies 173 for 2 (Simmons 67*, Lewis 40, Pooran 38*) beat India 170 for 7 (Dube 54, Pant 33*, Walse 2-28, Williams 2-30) by eight wickets

Thiruvananthapuram: West Indies registered a comprehensive 8-wicket win against India in the second T20 international at Greenfield International Stadium, Thiruvananthapuram on Sunday to level the three-match series.

Chasing 171 to stay alive in the series, West Indies reached the target in 18.3 overs, with opener Lendl Simmons remaining unbeaten on 67. Nicholas Pooran, who was making a comeback to international cricket after a four-match ban, also remained not out on 38 off 18 balls.

For the second time in the series, the Indian fielders were all over the place and were guilty of dropping catches and misfields, which made life easier for the West Indies batsmen.

Earlier put into bat, India were restricted to 170/7 in their 20 overs after some exceptional bowling by West Indies in the death overs. Young all-rounder Shivam Dube starred with the bat for India and in the process brought up his maiden international fifty.

India opener KL Rahul (11) and Rohit Sharma (15) both failed to shine with the bat but it was Shivam Dube - surprisingly sent in at No.3 - who exploded in the middle overs to give the Indian innings some much-needed momentum.

Dube departed after a devastating 54 off 30 balls.

Virat Kohli (19) also failed to shine as India's regular top three were sent back to the pavilion without much bother for the West Indies.

Rishabh Pant marshaled the later part of the India innings, his unbeaten 33 off 22 balls ensuring that India reached a decent target on a pitch where most batsmen seemed to struggle.

Kesrick Williams (2/30), who got sweet revenge for the hammering he received in Friday's T20I and leg spinner Hayden Walsh Jr (2/28) were the pick of the Windies bowlers.

Though West Indies got off to a slow start to their chase of 171, the visitors were always in reach of the target because of the lack of wickets.

India suffered another bad day in the field, as catches went down again - Washington Sundar and Pant being again being under the spotlight.

Evin Lewis (40) was stumped off Washington Sundar's bowling in the 10th over as India got their first breakthrough.

However, the batsmen who followed him - Shimron Hetmyer (23 off 14 balls) and Nicholas Pooran - were in no mood to hang around, as Lendl Simmons held the other end.