After wrapping up the home season, India will lock horns with Kiwis in the much-awaited New Zealand tour (5 T20Is, 3 ODIs and 2 Tests), starting with the T20I series. The first fixture of the T20I five-match rubber will kick-start on 24 January at 12:20 PM in Eden Park. The Men in Blue will enter this series with an empathic win against Australia in their previous assignment and will look to overhaul their World Cup 2019 semi-final against the Black Caps.
Following the consecutive series victories, India will aim to maintain their winning streak and New Zealand will fight back with its power-packed squad. On this note, let’s take a look at the facts and milestones that are expected to be achieved ahead of the series.
1 – India has won only once in T20I on New Zealand soil last year when they thrashed the hosts by 7 wickets.
354 – Total runs that Indian skipper Virat Kohli needs to become 3rd most run-scorer as captain in International cricket in 11 scheduled matches (T20I, ODI and Tests)
242 – Runs that Virat Kohli requires to score in five T20I games to be the captain with most runs in the shortest format of the game.
191– Runs that NZ captain Kane Williamson needs to achieve the same feat (skipper with most runs).
1032 – Kohli has amassed 1032 runs as captain in T20I cricket and is likely to get one step ahead in the race of becoming a batsman with most Man-of-the-match (MOM) awards, which he currently shares with Mohammad Nabi.
Mohammad Nabi – 12 MOM awards in 75 T20I matches
Virat Kohlli – 12 MOM awards in 78 T20I matches
14,000 – Rohit Sharma is 111 runs away from becoming the 8th Indian with 14,000 runs in international cricket as an opener.
2 – Rohit Sharma is likely to cross 10,000 runs, making him the second-fastest Indian player to achieve this landmark after Sachin Tendulkar (214 innings). He has scored 9937 runs in 216 international innings.
6000 – Ross Taylor needs 26 more runs to touch the milestone of 6000 T20I runs. Ross Taylor will become the 1st NZ player to play 100 T20Is at the need of the series.
64 – Martin Guptill needs only 64 more runs to become the third batsman with 2500 T20I runs, after Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma.
508 – Martin Guptill has scored 508 runs at an average of 46.18 in 12 T20Is including one century and 4 fifties at Eden Park in Auckland.
11 – Number of wickets Ish Sodhi has scalped at an average of 16.18 in 7 T20Is against India.
50 – In order to complete 50 wickets in T20I cricket, Mitchell Santner and Ish Sodhi need 1 and 3 more wickets respectively.
