IND v NZ, World Cup 2023: Heavy fog in Dharamsala interrupts India’s chase of 274

Heavy fog in Dharamsala stalled India’s chase of 274 against New Zealand in their World Cup 2023 match at the scenic Himachal Pradesh Cricket Association Stadium in Ahmedabad on Sunday. It all started getting hazy at around 7:30 pm IST and the play continued only to stop a little while later as the visibility dipped.

India were 100 for 2 in 15.4 overs when the umpires decided to take the two sets of players off the field in Dharamsala. On-air commentators explained that the visibility kept dipping after 7:30 pm IST and that they were not able to see the other side of the stadium. Television visuals showed that the floodlights were covered in haze.

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The umpires had a long chat with the two Indian batters Virat Kohli and Shreyas Iyer and New Zealand’s captain Tom Latham before taking off the players.

The Duckworth-Lewis and Stern method would come into play, the officials confirmed as ruled similar to ones used in rain interruptions. It turned out that India needed 124 for 2 at the end of 20 overs for a result to be produced as the chasing team had to complete that quota of overs.

However, after a brief interruption of 12 minutes, the play resumed with the fog lifting. The visibility was much better when the players returned to the middle and the umpires allowed play to resume at 7:50 pm IST.

This was one of the rarest occasions in international cricket when fog caused an interruption in play with the other being the fogg-affected Test series between Zimbabwe and Pakistan in Pakistan in 1998-99.

India raced off to a strong start in their chase of 274 after Rohit Sharma went after the BlackCaps new ball bowlers. Rohit hit 46 off just 40 balls as he made sure there was no top-order collapse this time.

However, Lockie Ferguson got the wickets of both Rohit and Shubman Gill before Virat Kohli adn Shreyas Iyer joined hands in the middle.