India win their 1st practise match

Canterbury: A superb half century by Virat Kohli and some brilliant bowling at the death by RP Singh and Munaf Patel enabled India to win their tour match against Kent by five runs on Friday.

Set a victory target of 165 off 20 overs in a rain affected game, it turned out to be a case of so near yet so far for the hosts who finished at 159/5 as opener Joe Denly scored a magnificent 100 from just 68 balls.

Martin van Jaarsveld and Darren Stevens tried hard to give Denly support from the other end with but once the centurion departed Kent's chase fell apart.

RP shone with the ball for India picking up two wickets for 36 runs while Munaf (1/22) and Ravichandran Ashwin (1/30) scalped a wicket each.

Kohli struck three sixes and seven fours in his innings of 77 as India ended up scoring 164/6. Rohit Sharma gave Kohli good support from the other end with a run-a-ball 30.

Earlier, the match was reduced to a twenty overs per side clash after persistent rain and a wet outfield delayed the start of the game which was initially supposed to be a 50 over affair.

After four pitch inspections it was finally decided that the contest would get underway at 7:30 pm (local time).

Following a win in their first one-day practice match against Sussex, a heavy downpour prevented the start of India's second warm-up tie.