India T20I skipper Suryakumar Yadav has responded after the Men in Blue faced a scathing 76-run loss against South Africa in their first match of the Super 8. The Indian captain backed his bowlers after the match while stating that the batters should have done a better job to prevent the colossal loss.
“We’re always in the game. When we started, I think we bowled really well in the beginning — 20-21 for three — and the way they batted after that, from 7 to 15 (overs), I think they batted really well. And then we came back again in the game later on. Overall, if we see, we bowled really well, but we could have batted a little better,” Surya said in the post-match presentation.
“Sometimes you’ve got to think, if you’re chasing 180-185, you can’t win the game in the powerplay, but you might lose the game in the powerplay. We lost too many wickets in the powerplay and then we couldn’t build the small partnerships we wanted while chasing 180-185, but that’s part of the game,” he added.
Surya was also asked about the gameplan for Team India ahead of their next Super 8 clash against Zimbabwe. The Indian captain responded, “Hopefully bat well, bowl well and field well, that’s it. We’ll try and keep it simple. Play the same brand of cricket which we want to play and nothing changes.”
India face scathing loss against South Africa:
South African captain Aiden Markram won the toss and decided to bat first in the Super 8 clash at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad. The Proteas had far from a perfect start as they lost three wickets inside the powerplay with just 20 runs on the board. However, the pair of David Miller (63 off 35 balls) and Dewald Brevis (45 off 29 balls) stabilized the innings and made sure that South Africa dominated the middle overs.
Even after the wickets of Brevis and Miller, South Africa had Tristan Stubbs (44 off 24 balls) to give the finishing touches to the innings as they posted a total of 187 runs in their 20 overs.
India had an almost similar start to South Africa as they lost three wickets inside the powerplay. However, unlike the stabilizing act by Miller and Brevis, the Men in Blue continued to lose momentum as they lost Washington Sundar in the 8th over and then the skipper in the 10th over while having just 51 runs on the board. While the match was almost set at that point, the slow scoring rate and continuous wickets ensured that the Men in Blue lost by a huge margin of 76 runs, which also significantly dented their chances of reaching the semi-final.
