Shikhar Dhawan roars back into the Indian ODI team with a spectacular fifty vs Australia

Shikhar Dhawan made a solid comeback to the ODI format with a vital knock of a 91-ball 74 against Australia during the first ODI at the Wankhede Stadium on Monday. He played a patient game when India had lost the big wicket of Rohit Sharma early on in the innings. 

Dhawan had added 121 runs for the second-wicket stand along with KL Rahul. Just when it looked it appeared like he would repeat the heroics of the World Cup 2019, he was dismissed after being caught by Ashton Agar off Pat Cummins. Dhawan had scored a match-winning century against the Aaron Finch-led side during their league match of last year's showpiece event. 

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Kohli says that it will be an evenly contested series

While addressing the media ahead of the first ODI, Indian skipper Virat Kohli had said that the series against the five-time world champions will be an evenly contested one.

''Yeah, they are a stronger side than the side that came last time to India but they still won the series but the time they came before that were full-strength where we won the series. So actually you can have the most experienced or skilled players but if you don't play well as a team in that series, you won't win which happened with us last time and when we went to Australia the similar thing happened with them," Kohli said.

"So that shows you how competitive that series is between the two teams and it is never a dominating series. It is always 3-2, 2-1 that kind of series. So, yeah it's gonna be exciting. It's a short series. Maybe five games would have been more exciting but still taking on Australia, even in our conditions they have played so much IPL cricket'', Virat Kohli further stated.

''Now they are pretty experienced in our conditions. They know what they need to do and having played a lot against each other, we know strengths and weaknesses either sides. Yeah, it is always a good and a tough challenge playing Australia purely because of the skillset and the mindset that they bring on the field,'' he added. 

(Image Courtesy: @BCCI)

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