India vs New Zealand | Virat Kohli blames poor batting for India's defeat in Rajkot T20I

11/05/2017

After a shambolic 40-run loss in Rajkot, Virat Kohli has singled out India's poor batting as the reason for the loss while crediting Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Jasprit Bumrah for pulling things back. Kohli has also praised MS Dhoni for his effort but also admitted that the target was too much at the end.

After opting to bat first, New Zealand started off really well and opener Collin Munro’s unbeaten 109 runs helped the visitors post 196/2 in their allotted 20 overs. Munro faced 58 balls in his innings and got a very good support from his fellow opener Martin Guptill from the other end who scored 45 as the duo put together an opening stand of 105 runs in 67 balls.

"I thought New Zealand were really good with the bat early on. We didn't take our chances, yes, but at once stage, they were looking to get 235-240 and credit to Bumrah and Bhuvi to pull things back," Kohli said after the match as quoted by IANS.

"Eventually we weren't good enough with the bat. When you're chasing 200, all the batsmen need to chip in, or one batsman has to keeping going at a 200 strike-rate. Tried to do my best. M.S. (Dhoni) was very good at the end. But we were left with a very difficult task. We lost the toss, we did not get to choose what we would have done. We were just not good enough on the day."

After Trent Boult (4/34) had sent the Indian openers packing, Virat Kohli (65) and MS Dhoni (49) tried hard to lead the fightback but it proved to be insufficient at the end as the Indian Team managed to score only 156 runs with the loss of seven wickets.

"That happens, you want to go for big shots. It has happened with a lot of batsmen where you don't get to go on strike. Sometimes you are in good form, but you don't get enough balls. It happens to a lot of batsmen," he said.

"We back our batsmen though. We back Hardik (Pandya), and it's just a little glitch. After 13-14 overs, it gripped a bit. But we have no excuses, we weren't good enough with the bat. There wasn't any kind of dew. The ball got scuffed up."

The decider of the series will be played at Greenfield International Stadium in Thiruvananthapuram on November 7.