Was this the greatest innings Rishabh Pant has played?

Rishabh Pant played an unbelievable, career-defining innings as India came back from certain defeat to quell England in the 3rd ODI.

His unbeaten 125 and Hardik Pandya’s superb all-round display have helped India seal a five-wicket victory and a 2-1 series win over England at Old Trafford.

Pant became the fourth Indian wicketkeeper to score a century in ODIs.

The southpaw raced away to a 106-ball hundred and joined MS Dhoni, Rahul Dravid and KL Rahul as the Indian keepers who have scored ODI centuries.

Dhoni tops the list with nine hundreds.

Dravid has four centuries to his name while KL Rahul has scored one, where he was designated as wicket keeper.

Prior to the game, Pant had played 26 matches in which he scored five half-centuries with a top score of 85.

Pant rescues India from brink

Pant came to bat after Reece Topley removed both Indian openers with the score at 21 for two.

India lost skipper Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli for 17 runs each after both the batters fell to Reece Topley, while chasing 260.

From there on, he stitched together a partnership of 133 runs along with Hardik Pandya.

Pandya was brilliant as he scored a fluent 71 off 55 balls in the company of Pant.

He was unlucky to lose his wicket to a spectacular catch by Ben Stokes off the bowling of Brydon Carse.

The pair stitched together 133 for the fifth wicket to set up a comfortable win, with Pant going on to score his maiden ton in the format.

The highlight of Pant’s innings was a spectacular burst of explosive hitting when he plundered 5 consecutive boundaries off David Willey.

“Hopefully, I’ll remember my first ODI century for the rest of my life,” Pant said.

“But when I was in there, I was just focusing on one ball at a time. When a team is under pressure and you bat like that, that’s what you aspire to do.”

How the England innings went

England were dismissed for 259 in 45.5 overs after being asked to bat by India.

Fast bowler Mohammed Siraj gave the Indians a perfect start by dismissing Jonny Bairstow and Root for ducks in the second over to leave England at 2-12.

Jason Roy (41) and Stokes (27) steadied the ship but Pandya struck in his first over to remove Roy and later dismissed Stokes to put the brakes on.

Moeen Ali then combined with Jos Buttler for a 75-run fifth-wicket stand before he was caught behind off Ravindra Jadeja.

India’s bowlers used the short ball to good effect and Buttler looked shaken up when he was hit twice on the helmet by two bouncers in one over from Siraj.

However, the skipper settled down and looked to push England towards a competitive total.

Then again, Pandya struck twice in the 36th over.

He dismissed Liam Livingstone (27) before getting rid of Buttler (60), with both batters holing out to Jadeja in the deep.

Craig Overton made 32 but the tail was cleaned up by Yuzvendra Chahal who took 3-60.

“We were short on runs,” admitted Buttler.

“We needed a good start with the ball so that was fantastic. We created chances, but two guys took the game away from us, that’s where we lost the game.”

Indian paceman Jasprit Bumrah missed the decider due to a back spasm.

India 261 for 5 (Pant 125*, Hardik 71, Topley 3-35) beat England 259 (Buttler 60, Roy 41, Hardik 4-24, Chahal 3-60) by five wickets