WI vs IND: Felt good that somebody took a nice catch on my bowling, says Jadeja on Kohli's stunning grab

Bridgetown, July 28: After India thrashed West Indies by five wickets in the ODI series opener at Kensington Oval, left-arm spin all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja lauded Virat Kohli's one-handed stunning catch to dismiss Romario Shepherd.

In the 18th over of the West Indies innings on Thursday, Jadeja found a good turn to extract the outside edge of Shepherd's bat off an attempted drive. Kohli, who was stationed at the second slip took a brilliant one-handed low catch falling to his right, to dismiss the batter, leaving Jadeja in awe of him.

"Generally, I take such catches when others are bowling. But it felt good that somebody took a nice catch like this on my bowling. But it was a very good catch taken by him. He had to take it low and it was a sharp catch. Plus, he did not get a lot of time. The batter went for a drive and he had hardly less than a second to react," said Jadeja to Kuldeep Yadav in a video posted by the BCCI on their social media handles.

Jadeja, who has taken stunning catches in the past, added, "I would say it was a very excellent catch (from Kohli). Even Shubman Gill also took a nice catch. It was also a low catch.

On wickets like these, the confidence of bowlers will be boosted only when they get required support from the fielders. These half-chances should be converted into wickets, then only the bowlers will feel confident."

In the match, which India won by five wickets, Jadeja took 3-37 while Kuldeep picked 4-6 to skittle the West Indies for just 114. Jadeja and Kuldeep also became the first-ever pair of Indian left-arm spinners to scalp seven wickets or more in an ODI match.

"Fast bowlers bowled well in the start. Mukesh (Kumar) bowled well on his debut. You ran through their middle order and then I took the rest with the intention to get them out in two-three overs. We bowled well as a bowling unit," said Kuldeep, when quizzed about his player of the match performance.

On the other hand, Jadeja said that the wicket offered some good spin and he along with Kuldeep did a good job.

"The wicket offered some good spin and when you start to bowl as a spinner, you tend to get an idea of the degree of turn and bounce there. Our attempt was to give as few runs as possible as when we batted in the second innings, it was getting difficult to bat as the ball wasn’t coming on well and was spinning a lot. As a bowling unit, we hunted in pairs and both did a good job," the all-rounder said.