India continued their exasperating sequence of flops in the finals as New Zealand rode on Nathan Astle's scintillating century to clinch the Videocon Cup with a comfortable six-wicket victory today.
The right-handed Astle cracked an unbeaten 115 to help his team overhaul the target of 277 and leave the Indians licking the wounds of yet anotherembarrassing defeat in a summit showdown.
The Indians, who have not won a multi-nation tournament for a long time, failed to break the long-standing jinx yet again as they were thoroughly outplayed by the Kiwis at the Harare Sports Club.
A total of 276 does not quite reflect the failure of Indian batsmen who lost the plot in the middle overs and fell short by at least 40 runs which could have tested the New Zealanders in the afternoon.