IND vs BAN | Bangladesh strong team despite Shakib's absence, states Yuzvendra Chahal
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India's premier leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal credited the Bangladesh team for their immaculate performance in the first T20I and asserted that they were a good team despite missing a few big names. Chahal further believes that India will more often than not win matches if they bowl well as a unit.
In the wake of the Shakib Al Hasan's shock ban from cricket, the Bangladesh Cricket team headed into the series with all but no hope and were expected to offer little fight to the mighty Indian team, despite the hosts missing Virat Kohli. However, what panned out in the first T20I struck everyone by surprise as the Tigers outclassed a strong Indian team in all three aspects of the game, walking away as victors in the smoggy capital of India.Â
Yuzvendra Chahal, who was the star for India with the ball giving away just 24 runs off his quota of four overs, credited the Bangladesh team for their outstanding showing in the first T20I and labelled them as a strong team despite the absence of Shakib Al Hasan and Tamim Iqbal. Chahal also asserted on the fact that India, at no point in time, allowed complacency to creep in despite the Bangladeshi team being relatively weak.
"Even without Shakib Al Hasan and Tamim Iqbal, Bangladesh are a very decent team. The whole team is very experienced and even the younger players who came into the team, like the leg-spinner (Aminul Islam), bowled well," Chahal told reporters in a press conference on Tuesday.
"We are not looking at them as a weak team just because they have a couple of players missing. They are a very decent team and they gave us a good fight," he added.
In the absence of the likes of Jasprit Bumrah, Bhunveshwar Kumar and Mohammed Shami, Chahal finds himself in the team as the most experienced bowler and in the first T20I, the leggie made his experience talk, being the pick of the Indian bowlers. However, the other inexperienced bowlers - namely Khaleel Ahmed, Washington Sundar and Deepak Chahar - were not quite up to the mark, often letting the Bangladeshi batsmen off the hook at the wrong time.
But despite them being relatively inexperienced at the international stage, Chahal believes that their IPL experience adds a lot of value to the team. He also further insisted that bowling is a group effort and went on to state that team India will win matches if all bowlers collectively bowled well as a group.
"All of our bowlers have still played close to 30-40 IPL matches and they have a lot of experience. I probably have played only a few more T20s compared to them. I just bowl 4 overs in a match and the rest 16 is in the hands of the others. If we bowl well as a team, we will win. As bowling is not just a matter of one person".Â
Chahal also further went on to praise the tactics of Bangladesh, which saw them bowl two off-spinners when Shikhar Dhawan and Rishabh Pant were at the crease and lauded their consistency. Chahal further added that the Indian bowlers also put on a good show, but admitted that the Bangladesh spinners were a tad better, eventually resulting in them walking away with the win.
"I think their spinners bowled really well. Especially when Rishabh and Shikhar were batting, Mahmudullah went ahead with two off-spinners and it was a good move.Â
"Even we bowled well. If you're defending 147 and they are winning in the 19th over, it doesn't mean we didn't bowl well. But compared to both the team's spinners, they bowled really well."
