It was business as usual for Daryl Mitchell in the opening game of the three-match series against India in Vadodara on Sunday (January 11). The all-rounder paced his innings superbly to produce a 71-ball 84 to take the Black Caps to a respectable total after the visitors had briefly lost their way in the middle overs.
Mitchell's knock was his sixth fifty plus score in the last ten ODI innings with one of those knocks having been converted to a hundred. After ending 2025 as the second-highest run scorer in the 50-over format, Mitchell has started the new year in similar form. The all-rounder also has excellent recent form against India, having now belted two hundreds and two fifties in his last five innings.
Before the start of this series, Mitchell was ranked at no.3 in the ICC men's ODI batters list with 766 points. Virat Kohli (773) and Rohit Sharma (781) are the batters above Mitchell in the list. The veteran Indian duo is expected to have a good series but if Mitchell has superb performances with the bat in both the remaining games, he has an outside chance of going to no.1 in the rankings.
Given the nature of pitches along with India resting Jasprit Bumrah and Varun Chakaravarthy, Mitchell has advantages in his favour but he would not only need to score big in the next two games but also hope that Rohit and Kohli don't score in every game. In the South Africa series, Kohli had two tons and a fifty while Rohit had two fifties to his name.
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In the Australia series prior to that, Rohit had two fifties and a century while Kohli had a fifty alongside two ducks. The two senior batters have shown immense hunger to polish their game with the 2027 ODI World Cup in mind. They even featured in domestic white-ball games to sharpen themselves for the international fixtures.
Regardless of whether or not he scales the no.1 rankings in this series, Mitchell is arguably New Zealand's best ODI batter at the moment.
