IND vs SA 2025-26, 1st ODI: “King” Kohli continues his golden run in Ranchi, guiding India to a solid 1-0 series lead.
Brief Scores: India 349/8 (Virat Kohli 135, KL Rahul 60, Ottneil Bartman 2/60) beat South Africa 332 (Matthew Breetzke 72, Marco Jansen 70, Kuldeep Yadav 4/68) by 17 runs and lead series 1-0.
After an embarrassing whitewash defeat against South Africa in the 2-match Test series, hosts India started the white-ball leg with a win in the first ODI at Ranchi by 17 runs. Earlier in the game, a typical Virat Kohli ODI century helped India pile up a huge score of 349 runs on the board.
Talking Point – Bosch and Jansen expose India’s bowling unit
India had a splendid beginning to their defense of 349 as the lead pacers, Harshit Rana and Arshdeep Singh, picked three wickets in no time.
But when they were expected to drive home the advantage by making further inroads, they let the game drift away.
With Breetzke holding one end, Marco Jansen took charge by smashing India bowlers round the park. Once he departed, India had an opportunity to seal the deal by the 34th over, but instead they let Corbin Bosch to settle in. On any other day, this could have proved to be curtains for India.
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Virat Kohli takes center stage with yet another ODI century
India lost their 19th toss in succession in ODI cricket and were inserted to bat first by South Africa skipper Aiden Markram. The start wasn’t ideal. On what looked like a great batting surface, India lost the wicket of opener Yashasvi Jaiswal quite early into the innings.
The experienced pair of Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli made sure that there were no further hiccups in the powerplays as the duo gave India a blistering start. In the first 10 overs, the hosts reached 80/1 with Kohli being the aggressor. The pair continued from where they left off at Sydney roughly a month ago, with their second successive hundred-plus stand (136).
Rohit lost his wicket soon after reaching his third consecutive fifty-plus score in ODIs. As a result, India lost a bit of the momentum, even though Kohli continued in his sublime way. The Proteas came back with the wickets of Ruturaj Gaikwad and Washington Sundar. They also stemmed the flow of runs by keeping Kohli off the strike for the larger part of this phase.
The former skipper reached his record 52nd ODI ton before accelerating towards the end. The last 10 overs saw India score 85 runs with skipper KL Rahul and Ravindra Jadeja playing handy cameos.
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SA lower middle-order keep them in hunt despite early wickets
Chasing a mammoth total of 350 to keep their winning streak going in India, South Africa were off to a disastrous start. They lost two wickets in Harshit Rana’s opening over before Arshdeep Singh sent back skipper Aiden Markram. However, a flurry of boundaries followed, from the bat of Tony de Zorzi and Matthew Breetzke, as the Proteas ended the powerplay phase at 47/3.
Finally, their 66-run stand was broken, courtesy of a superb leg-break from Kuldeep Yadav, seeing the back of de Zorzi. Dewald Brevis then played a fine little cameo of a 28-ball 37 to keep South Africa in the game before Marco Jansen took over.
Marco Jansen (70) continued his hard-hitting batting form against India, as he stitched a 97-run stand with Breetzke. But, Kuldeep removed both the batters in the same over, exploiting the home advantage for India.
Corbin Bosch threatened with his stunning display of big-hits in the late overs but India pacers held the nerve to seal a win.
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What’s Next
India will want to put on a more clinical performance with the ball when the teams meet again at Raipur in three days’ time. On the other hand, South Africa will look to get back to the winning ways and level the series, setting up a decider in the series finale.
Statistical Highlights from IND vs SA, 1st ODI, Ranchi, 2025
- Yashasvi Jaiswal got dismissed for the sixth time against left-arm pacers in international white-ball cricket.
- Virat Kohli & Rohit Sharma brought up their 37th fifty-plus partnership in ODIs.
- The Rohit-Kohli pair now has 20 century partnerships in ODIs; it is the joint-second-most century stands for a batting pair, along with Dilshan-Sangakkara. Tendulkar-Ganguly have the most century stands in ODIs (26)
- Rohit Sharma (352) went past Shahid Afridi (351) to become the batter with the most sixes in ODIs.
- Virat Kohli got his 52nd ODI hundred, which is also his third at the JSCA Stadium in Ranchi.
- Virat Kohli now has 519 runs at the JSCA Stadium in Ranchi. It is now one of the six venues across the world where Kohli has 500+ ODI runs.
- Virat Kohli hit 7 sixes in his innings of 135 in this game. It is the joint-second-most maximums in an ODI innings for Kohli. He had hit 7 sixes in his knock of 100*(52) against Australia in Jaipur 2013. The most sixes recorded in a Kohli innings is 8, which he hit en route his 166*(110) against Sri Lanka in Thiruvananthapuram in 2023.
- India’s total of 349-8 is their second-highest team score against South Africa in ODI cricket.
- Virat Kohli now has six ODI hundreds against South Africa, the highest for any batter against this opposition in the said format.
Top Twitter Reactions from IND vs SA, 1st ODI, Ranchi 2025-26
A diamond is forever. #ViratKohli . #No52.
— Harsha Bhogle (@bhogleharsha) November 30, 2025
Virat Kohli ne phir dikhaya run banana unke liye utna hi aasaan hai jitna hamare liye chai banana. 52nd ODI century. Kohli is not chasing records, records are chasing Kohli. Aaj bhi bhook wahi, junoon wahi.
— Virrender Sehwag (@virendersehwag) November 30, 2025
King stays King ! pic.twitter.com/HhhCAQgj7p
मेरे तन के ज़ख़्म ना गिन अभी,
— Wasim Jaffer (@WasimJaffer14) November 30, 2025
मेरी आँख में अभी नूर है
मेरी बाज़ुओं पे निगाह कर,
जो ग़ुरूर था वो ग़ुरूर है #INDvSA #ViratKohli #RohitSharma pic.twitter.com/wqqUXC3VYx
He is back in his engine room. #ODI
— Ashwin 🇮🇳 (@ashwinravi99) November 30, 2025
👌👌 Top class #INDvRSA pic.twitter.com/jS9762AV9h
India win after much huffing and huffing. SA deserve praise for taking match deep after losing 3 early wickets. Jansen and Brreetzke falling in the same over was turning point. India will be happy to break sequence of defeats against a very determined team
— Cricketwallah (@cricketwallah) November 30, 2025
Virat kohli shows old is still good. Shower of sixes to set tempo, holding on as wickets fell and all out aggression after reaching 100. Master class in pacing the ODI innings, lesson for youngsters who struggled towards the end.
— Mohammad Kaif (@MohammadKaif) November 30, 2025
Form is Temporary…Kohli is permanent #ODI #ViratKohli #IndvSA
— Aakash Chopra (@cricketaakash) November 30, 2025
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