hreyas Iyer’s composed 79 off 98 balls and Varun Chakravarthy’s outstanding 5/42 powered India to a 44-run victory over New Zealand in their final Group A match on Sunday, securing their place at the top of the table and setting up a semifinal showdown with Australia in the ICC Champions Trophy.
Despite Iyer’s resilient knock under pressure, New Zealand pacer Matt Henry (5/42) restricted India to 249/9 in 50 overs.
Williamson, who was dropped on 17 by KL Rahul off Axar Patel, played a well-calculated innings built on timing and placement. However, he lacked support from his teammates. His 44-run stand with Daryl Mitchell for the third wicket briefly steadied New Zealand, but Kuldeep Yadav broke the partnership by trapping Mitchell lbw.
The dismissals of Tom Latham (14), Glenn Phillips (12), and Michael Bracewell (2) in quick succession put further pressure on Williamson. Despite that, the New Zealand captain displayed his class with crisp stroke play, including two elegant cover drives off Jadeja.
However, his resistance came to an end when Axar Patel angled a fuller delivery past him, and Rahul completed a sharp stumping. With Williamson gone, India had the game firmly in their grasp.
Earlier, India’s innings was built on Iyer’s responsible knock, a crucial 98-run partnership with Axar Patel (42 off 61), and a late flourish from Hardik Pandya 45 off 45
Though wickets at regular intervals disrupted India’s momentum, Hardik provided the late push with aggressive stroke play, propelling India close to the 250-run mark.