India and England are currently competing with one another in the 29th match of the ICC World Cup 2023 at the Ekana Sports City, Lucknow, on Sunday and an unwanted record has been set during the crucial clash.
For the first time in the history of the Cricket World Cup, the number three batters of both teams — Virat Kohli and Joe Root — lost their wickets without scoring a run.
Kohli was removed by David Willey in the first innings for a nine-ball duck while Root became the victim of in-form Jasprit Bumrah.
The Indian bowlers have caused all kinds of problems for the English batters as after 13 overs, the defending have lost four wickets for just 45 runs.
By the time this story was filed, Moeen Ali (4*) and skipper Jos Buttler (5*) were on the crease.
Batting first, Indian batters struggled on the tricky wicket of Lucknow from the start as opener Shubman Gill lost his wicket after scoring nine runs, leaving his side 26-1 in four overs.
He was followed by Kohli and Shreyas Iyer as the English bowlers continued to push the home side's batters and made them stand at 40-3 in 11.5 overs.
However, the Blues got a much-needed breakthrough courtesy of 91-run partnership between Rohit Sharma and KL Rahul.
After Rahul walked back to the pavilion, Suryakumar Yadav became Sharma's partner during the innings.
However, Sharma couldn't hold on to his wicket as he failed to read Adil Rashid's googly and ended up playing a sloppy shot, eventually getting caught by Liam Livingstone after scoring crucial 87 runs, leaving his side at 164-5 in 36.5 overs.
For once it looked like the Blues would have to settle for a score under 200 runs but Yadav scored valuable 49 runs, missing his half-century just by a run as he was caught by Chris Woakes at deep back point.
India could score 229-9 in the allocated 50 overs.
England had won the toss and opted to field first.