NZ vs IND 4th ODI: Iyer’s Team India in the fourfront!

India players during a practice session at the Bay Oval in Mount Maunganui on Thursday. PICS/BCCI

They promised us an hour and a half's drive from Hamilton to the Tauranga Bus Station, which is exactly what they delivered. Now, they have promised us a rain-free next three days here in Mount Maunganui, a promise all stakeholders of India's ongoing tour of New Zealand will be desperately hoping holds true too.

The weather has played truant from the start of the One-Day International series in Auckland last Wednesday. The first game escaped relatively unscathed, but the second in Wellington was brutally interrupted at a pivotal phase and the third in Hamilton on Tuesday was washed out without a ball being bowled.

The offshoot of all this is that, sitting on a 2-0 advantage, India need to win only one of the two remaining games, both at the Bay Oval, to consign the Kiwis to their first bilateral ODI home series defeat in 12 attempts.

It will be up to Shreyas Iyer to mastermind that coup, as India's 29th ODI skipper; the 31-year-old is standing in for Shubman Gill, who is in Wellington with KL Rahul and Anshul Kamboj from the ODI squad and with other Test regulars, topping up their skills for the Test showdown in a week's time. Shreyas is no stranger to the national captaincy, having led the T20I outfit since June. Even so, it will be quite an experience for him to helm a side that includes two of the greatest white-ball batters ever, Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli.

It isn't just India who are without key batting resources. If anything, New Zealand are even more handicapped after Tom Latham, Henry Nicholls, Daryl Mitchell, Glenn Phillips and Nathan Smith were all withdrawn from the last two matches to further their Test preparations. No New Zealand side is ever a pushover, not at home and with so much still riding on the outcome of matches, but if the time was ever ripe for India to step in and deliver the knockout blow, it is now.

Pace bowling groups from both teams relished the conditions at Eden Park and in Wellington, though one isn't sure exactly how much help they will get from the Bay Oval strip. Some of the thick covering of grass was shaved off on Thursday afternoon, not long before Shreyas led his troops to the venue for their first meaningful and full net session since Auckland on November 3.

The sense of anticipation was hard to miss among the Indian boys - the young and restless such as Gurnoor Brar and Auqib Nabi, the wizened like Rohit and Virat, and the captain, nonchalant only outwardly, one is certain.

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No of wins for India in three ODIs at Mount Maunganui