Shreyas Iyer and Shai Hope have both made 102 not out, and the series goes to Indore level at 1-1
India and West Indies play the third of five T20Is at the Holkar Stadium on Sunday at 7pm IST, after each captain’s hundred won a game.
Oct 11, 2026
Both captains in this series have made the same score. Shreyas Iyer hit 102 not out off 43 balls to win the first T20I in Lucknow, and Shai Hope answered with 102 not out off 45 to win the second in Ranchi. So the five-match series is 1-1, and it moves to Indore’s Holkar Stadium for the third game on Sunday, 11 October, with a 7pm IST start.
If the first two games are any guide, the bowlers are in for another long evening. Indore is not a ground that tends to help them.
Two very different wins
Lucknow was comfortable for India. Naman Dhir took three wickets on his T20I debut, West Indies were bowled out for 171 in 19.1 overs, and Iyer and Ishan Kishan added 137 for the third wicket as India got home by eight wickets with 32 balls left. Iyer’s was his first T20I hundred.
Ranchi was the opposite. India made 249 for 5, their highest T20I total against West Indies, and still lost. Mayank Yadav struck twice in the first over of the chase, but Mayank also put down Sherfane Rutherford at short fine leg, and Rutherford went on to 84 and added 120 with Hope. West Indies won with nine balls to spare, the highest successful chase in their T20I history.
What Indore usually serves up
The Holkar Stadium has short boundaries and a true surface, and the scores show it. India’s 260 for 5 against Sri Lanka in 2017, built on Rohit Sharma’s 118 off 43 balls, is still the highest T20I total there. In 2022 South Africa made 227 for 3, Rilee Rossouw scoring 100 not out off 48, and beat India by 49 runs.
The odd thing is that the big chases have not come. The highest successful one in a T20I at this ground is India’s 173 for 4 against Afghanistan in January 2024, when Yashasvi Jaiswal and Shivam Dube both made fifties. Given what happened in Ranchi, I would not read too much into that. Dew could come into the second innings again, and India were bowling second when 249 was not enough on Friday.
India’s bowling choice
The question for Iyer is the attack. India have been going with three specialist bowlers and leaning on the all-rounders to fill the overs, and in Ranchi that left them short. Dube went for 30 in two overs and made 7 with the bat, and Mayank bowled only three overs despite taking 3 for 36. The obvious swap, if India want one, is Nitish Kumar Reddy for Dube.
West Indies have less to think about. They are likely to keep the side that won in Ranchi, with Hope keeping wicket and leading, and Roston Chase coming off 3 for 24 in that game.
India have won 21 of the 33 T20Is between the sides, with one no result. I would still make them favourites at home, but not by as much as that record suggests. Hope’s side have now chased 352 in an ODI and 250 in a T20I on this tour, so no total is going to feel safe.