England went 2-1 up in the T20 series after thrashing India in Ahmedabad.
The tourists cruised comfortably to an eight-wicket win and never looked in danger.
A superb knock of 83 not out from Jos Buttler smashed England to their victory target of 157.
England made just the one change, which saw Mark Wood recover from his injury that kept him out of the last T20 returning in place of Tom Curran.
India also made one change, with Rohit Sharma replacing Suryakumar Yadav.
England win the toss and choose to bowl
England won the toss and elected to bowl first, a decision that has seen the side win when doing so.
KL Rahul’s poor series continued as the returning Wood dismissed him for another duck with a superb delivery that came back in and sent middle stump flying.
Rohit soon followed him as he attempted a pull shot off Wood but could only pick out Jofra Archer, leaving the hosts 20-2.
The hero from the second game, Ishan Kishan, departed not long after as he got a top edge to Chris Jordan’s delivery that went straight through to Buttler.
Rishabh Pant was then run out after a quick throw from Sam Curran through to Buttler who saw Pant caught short.
Virat Kohli tried to accelerate India’s innings, but he could not stop Shreyas Iyer slapping Wood over point and being caught by Dawid Malan in the deep to give the Durham man his third wicket of the match.
Kohli continued to hit consistent boundaries and take the hosts beyond 150.
Jordan struck with the final ball of India’s innings as Hardik Pandya tried to swing, but only resulted in top edging straight to Archer.
India’s innings came to a close on 156-6, a score they would have been very happy with after the shaky start they had.
India set England a total of 157 to win
England’s innings got off to a flyer with Buttler looking to make amends from his duck in the previous game with some power hitting early on.
Jason Roy then departed after trying to sweep Yuzvendra Chahal and picking out Rohit at backward point.
Despite the loss of Roy, Buttler’s early hitting had fired the tourists to 23-1 – a much more comfortable position than that of India at the same point.
Buttler soon reached a blistering half-century off of just 26 balls.
The Lancashire man did not stop there, and continued to attack in search of a maiden T20 century.
Malan then tried to charge and move on England’s innings, ultimately paying the price as he missed his shot and was stumped by Pant.
Despite this, England were fully in command and two moments later summed up India’s day. First captain Kohli dropped the dangerman Buttler, followed by a Chahal drop of Jonny Bairstow.
It would be Bairstow and Buttler who would guide England home, with the former scoring back-to-back fours to secure the victory.
Buttler’s maiden T20 century was to evade him as he finished on a T20 best of 83 not out, which earned him the man of the match.
Captain Eoin Morgan also became the first Englishmen to play in 100 T20 internationals – and the fourth most overall.
With this victory it now means England cannot lose top spot in the T20 rankings, having won two matches in the five-match series.
The penultimate match begins on Thursday at 1:30pm, live on Sky Sports Cricket.
By Josh Mann
