Trinidad, June 6: India seized the initial advantage in the five-match ODI series against West Indies by beating the hosts in the first ODI being played at the Queen’s Park Oval here in Port of Spain. After the Indian bowlers, led by Harbajan Singh (three for 32), had done a good job to keep the West Indies down to a modest score of 214, Rohit Sharma, with an unbeaten knock of 68*, led India home with four wickets to spare.

Chasing a score of 215 to win, India’s run chase was helped by half-centuries from Shikhar Dhawan and Rohit Sharma. Dhawan’s innings, a mix of caution and aggression, was the only notable contribution from the top order as Parthiv Patel (13), Virat Kohli (2) and S Badrinath (17) failed to get going. However, having got to his half-century, Dhawan threw his wicket away as he tried to slog-sweep legspinner Anthony Martin but only ended up offering a catch to Lendl Simmons at deep midwicket. India were 104 for four in 25.4 overs at the loss of Dhawan’s wicket.

Sharma, who had joined Dhawan at the fall of Badrinath’s wicket with the Indian score at 61, and had survived some fortunate moments at the start of his own innings, then took control of India’s run chase. He added 80 for the fifth wicket in good time with Suresh Raina (43) while bringing up the sixth half-century of his ODI career.

West Indies struck some late blows towards the end, removing Raina and Yusuf Pathan (10) in the space of four overs. But with the required run-rate remaining well under control and Sharma remaining unbeaten, India went past the victory target with 31 deliveries to spare.

Earlier, Darren Sammy once again had the luck of the coin going his way as he won the toss for the second time in a row. The West Indies skipper had no hesitation in opting to bat first on a hot and sunny morning in Port of Spain. India made just one change to their squad from the side that played in the T20 game, legspinner Amit Mishra replacing Ravichandran Ashwin.

But the West Indies top order disappointed with their batting approach. Opener Lendl Simmons (6) charged down the track in order to accelerate the run-rate [just 23 runs from the first six overs] but only managed to top-edge a Praveen Kumar delivery to Harbhajan Singh at mid-off. Darren Bravo (4) perished an over later, edging a delivery from Munaf Patel to Rohit Sharma standing at widish slip. Then, with the West Indies score at 59, Harbhajan Singh struck the third blow for India in the 19th over. The offspinner had opener Kirk Edwards top-edging an attempted pull shot to Virat Kohli at first slip.

Then came the partnership that salvaged the West Indies innings. Ramnaresh Sarwan and Marlon Samuels added 82 runs for the fourth wicket before Sarwan ended up nicking a wide delivery down the leg side from Munaf Patel to wicketkeeper Parthiv Patel. Sarwan made 56, the 36th time the middle-order batsman had gone past the half-century mark. The hosts were 141 for four at the fall of Sarwan’s wicket.

43 runs from the batting powerplay [over 37.0 to 42.0] helped up the West Indies scoring rate to some extent, but a flurry of wickets thereafter prevented the hosts from finishing with a bang. Samuels scored 55 before he was bowled by Suresh Raina while Harbhajan accounted for the wickets of former Mumbai Indians teammate Dwayne Bravo [22 off 20] and Carlton Baugh [16 off 17] in successive overs.

From a score of 173 for four at the start of the 43rd over, West Indies slumped to a score of 214 for nine in their allotted 50 overs, which proved to be insufficient during the course of the day’s proceedings.

Brief scores: India 217/6 in 44.5 overs(Rohit Sharma 68*, Shikhar Dhawan 51, Anthony Martin 2/39)beat West Indies 214/9 in 50.0 overs (Ramnaresh Sarwan 56, Marlon Samuels 55, Harbhajan Singh 3/32, Suresh Raina 2/23) by four wickets

Man-of-the-match: Rohit Sharma for his match-winning innings of 68 not out [75 balls, 3x4, 1x6].