India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni said his side was the deserved winner in the third one-dayer in Kanpur on Thursday though England gave the closest fight in the series so far.

India won the match by 16 runs under Duckworth/Lewis method to take a 3-0 lead in the seven-match series and Dhoni said the home team was always ahead even under the D/L method.

"It was a tough match and it was the closest so far but we were ahead at every stage," he said. "In the morning when I went out for the toss I knew that D/L method could be applied as we know light fades away very fast at this venue after 4pm. So we were prepared, I had a chit of D/L calculations. Once we knew D/L method would be applied we decided to preserve wickets as we knew we were ahead and runs could be scored from the power play (to be taken by batting side)," he said after the match.

Dhoni said the pitch was a difficult one to bat on but his batsmen were up to the task by taking ones and twos and ensured that no wickets were lost once the D/L method came into picture.

"The pitch was slowing down and the odd ball turning. It was difficult to bat on. But we decided to preserve wickets and take the singles as D/L method was in mind," he added.

The India captain, however, warned his boys not to lower their guards, saying the series is far from over and they have to win one more match.

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