IND vs NZ 1st ODI: Kohli 74 Leads India to DLS Win

India beat New Zealand by 5 wickets on the DLS method in the 1st ODI at Eden Park, Auckland, on Wednesday. New Zealand were bowled out for 185 in 40.2 overs, rain cut India's chase to a target of 143 in 32 overs, and Virat Kohli's 74 off 51 balls got them there in 22.4 overs. India lead the five-match series 1-0, with the 2nd ODI in Wellington on Saturday.

The score says easy win. The game had three different stories in it: a seam attack that never needed its spinner, a Kohli innings that turned a rain-interrupted chase into a sprint, and a late wobble against the short ball that New Zealand will take into Wellington.

IND vs NZ 1st ODI: the scores

• New Zealand 185 all out in 40.2 overs (Tim Seifert 38 off 43, Blair Tickner 34 off 23, Glenn Phillips 30 off 51, Daryl Mitchell 28 off 41; Arshdeep Singh 4/70, Gurnoor Brar 3/44, Anshul Kamboj 2/22)
• India 143/5 in 22.4 overs (Virat Kohli 74 off 51, Shubman Gill 37 off 56, Shreyas Iyer 15 off 13; Jacob Duffy 3/49, Kyle Jamieson 1/34, Nathan Smith 1/21)
• Target: 143 in 32 overs (DLS method) after two rain breaks
• Result: India won by 5 wickets with 56 balls to spare. India lead the series 1-0.
• Toss: India won the toss and chose to bowl.
• Player of the match: Anshul Kamboj

India's XI: Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill (c), Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, Axar Patel, KL Rahul (wk), Naman Dhir, Arshdeep Singh, Auqib Nabi, Anshul Kamboj, Gurnoor Brar.

New Zealand's XI: Will Young, Tim Seifert, Henry Nicholls, Daryl Mitchell, Tom Latham (wk), Glenn Phillips, Mitchell Santner (c), Nathan Smith, Kyle Jamieson, Jacob Duffy, Blair Tickner.

Four seamers and no spin for 21 overs

Gill picked four out-and-out fast bowlers, Arshdeep, Nabi, Kamboj and Brar, with Axar Patel as the only spinner. Then he did not use Axar until the 22nd over. With the new ball moving early at Eden Park, it worked.

New Zealand were 45 for 2 after the 10-over powerplay. Arshdeep had Will Young caught by Iyer off a top-edged pull in the fifth over and Henry Nicholls caught by Naman Dhir in the ninth. Seifert played like he was still in the T20Is and was dropped on 7 by Dhir off Nabi in the fourth over, then scooped the next-but-one ball over the keeper for six. He made 38 before Brar's extra bounce had him caught at mid-on by substitute Ruturaj Gaikwad.

From 73 for 3 New Zealand lost six wickets for 73. Brar took a sharp return catch to remove Tom Latham for 3, Rohit Sharma's diving pick-up and throw to KL Rahul ran out Mitchell for 28, and Kamboj and Arshdeep took the tail. When Phillips hit Arshdeep straight to Iyer at mid-on in the 36th over, New Zealand were 146 for 9.

Axar bowled five overs for 12 runs. India's four seamers bowled the other 35.2 overs and took all nine wickets that did not come from a run-out.

Anshul Kamboj's 10-2-22-2

Kamboj was named player of the match, and the numbers from our ball-by-ball show why. In a game where New Zealand scored at 4.6 an over, he gave away 2.2.

• 10 overs, 2 maidens, 22 runs, 2 wickets
• 46 dot balls out of 60, by our count
• Only two fours conceded, one to Mitchell and one to Phillips
• His first over was a maiden, and so was the over in which Mitchell Santner played on

Kamboj also took the edge of Nathan Smith that Kohli caught one-handed, diving to his right at slip. It was one of Kohli's two catches. Kamboj bowled two spells of five overs, from the 8th to the 16th and from the 25th to the 33rd, and New Zealand never got after him in either.

The last-wicket stand that cost India 39 runs

At 146 for 9, New Zealand looked set for something around 160. Blair Tickner, batting at No. 11, made 34 off 23 balls with four sixes, the second-highest score in the innings. He and Jacob Duffy (15 not out) added 39 for the last wicket.

Most of that came in one over. Arshdeep's tenth over went 6, 6, wide, 0, 6, wide, 1, 2: 23 runs. Before that he had 4 for 47 from nine overs. He finished with 4 for 70, his figures hiding how well he bowled for most of the day. Brar ended it in the 41st over when Tickner edged to Rahul.

Those 39 runs took New Zealand from 146 to 185. In the end it did not matter, but it is the one part of India's bowling they will want to fix.

Two rain breaks and two DLS targets

India lost Rohit Sharma in the first over, caught at mid-off off Kyle Jamieson for a six-ball duck. Gill and Kohli then took the chase to 54 for 1 when rain stopped play at 10.5 overs.

• First break: a little over an hour. India's target was revised to 167 in 40 overs.
• Play restarted for seven balls. Gill hit Tickner for two fours and India reached 64 for 1 after 12 overs before the rain came back.
• Second break: about 45 minutes. The target became 143 in 32 overs.

That left India needing 79 off 20 overs with nine wickets in hand. They needed four an over. Kohli treated it like a T20 chase.

Virat Kohli's 74 off 51

Kohli was on 29 off 27 balls at the second restart. He then made 45 off his next 24 balls.

• His fifty came off 35 balls, with a pulled four off Tickner in the 16th over.
• That over, Tickner's fourth, went 4, 0, 0, 0, 4, 4. All three were pulls off short balls.
• He hit 13 fours and a six. 58 of his 74 runs came in boundaries.
• He and Gill added 113 for the second wicket, from 1 for 1 to 114 for 2.

Gill's 37 off 56 was the quieter half of the stand, and that suited the chase. He played out the new ball after Rohit's dismissal, while Kohli scored at better than a run a ball at the other end. When Gill was out, India needed 29 off 82 balls.

The short-ball wobble

From 114 for 1 India lost four wickets for 22 runs in 20 balls. Every one of them came from a short ball:

• Gill pulled Smith high in the air and Latham took the catch.
• Kohli tried to pull Duffy and was caught by Seifert.
• Axar was caught by Phillips off the next short ball from Duffy, two balls later, for a two-ball duck.
• Iyer got a short ball from Duffy over the keeper for six, then pulled the next one straight to Nicholls for 15.

Duffy took 3 for 16 in his last two overs. India were never in real danger, needing only seven when Iyer fell, and Naman Dhir finished it by pulling Smith for four. New Zealand bowled a lot short after the rain, and they will have noticed that four of India's five wickets came from it. It cut both ways, though: Kohli pulled the same length for boundaries, and Tickner's four overs went for 38.

Expect more of it in Wellington, especially to Iyer, who was hurried by it twice in his 13 balls.

Rohit Sharma's duck

Rohit, back in the ODI side for this series, faced six balls from Jamieson and was caught low at mid-off. He made up for some of it in the field with the run-out of Mitchell, New Zealand's best set batter at the time. One innings is no trend, and after 32, 100 and 92 against the West Indies last month, his ODI form is not in question.

What it means for the 2nd ODI

• India's four-seamer plan worked at Eden Park. Wellington is usually windier and quicker, so expect the same attack unless Gill wants Axar earlier.
• Kamboj is now hard to leave out. He and Brar look like the pair to keep, with Arshdeep leading the attack.
• New Zealand's batting has holes. Without Conway and Ravindra, their top six made 117 between them, and their No. 11 was their second-best scorer.
• New Zealand's short-ball plan is their best route back into the series.

The 2nd ODI is on Saturday, 7 November, at Hnry Stadium, Wellington, starting at 7:30 AM IST. You can follow every ball on our match centre.

Match page: tryball.in/match/ind-vs-nz-1st-odi-2026-11-04 Series page: tryball.in/series/india-tour-of-new-zealand-2026

By the TryBall cricket desk. Scorecard, fall of wickets and ball-by-ball figures are from TryBall's live coverage of the match.