Ben was on fire in the second ODI vs. India. His red hot 99 off 52 balls helped England to a blistering 6 wicket win with 39 balls to spare.
India paced their innings to set a testing target of 337.
This respectable target was given no respect by the England batters who started their high-octane chase with Jason Roy and Jonny Bairstow adding 110 for the first wicket.
After the loss of Roy (55), Ben strode out to the middle. After scoring just 3 runs from his first 8 balls, Ben started to burn, hitting his first of 10 sixes.
This was going to be a special innings from Ben.
After scoring 33 Ben’s bat just reached the safety of the batting crease as the stumps were broken. India thought he was run out, on review the decision was not out.
In the thirty-first over Ben reached his 50 (2 fours, 4 sixes) off 40 balls.
After passing his half-century, Ben whipped-up a destructive firestorm.
He smashed 19 off a Kuldeep Yadev over, including 3 sixes. Next Krunal Pandya was the target, Ben bashing 26 off the left arm spinner.
An ODI century was on the cards. It was not to be, Ben fell one short when gloving a ball down the leg-side to Rishabh Pant off Bhuvneshwar Kumar.
Together with centurion Bairstow (124) Ben added 175 for the second wicket and importantly shortening the odds of an England win.
Liam Livingston (27no) and Dawid Malan (16no) had the honour of guiding England to victory and in the process levelling the three-match series 1-1.
(Photo by Dan Mullan/Getty Images for ECB)
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