IPL 2018 | A loss just gives a slap in the face, says Stephen Fleming

05/04/2018

CSK coach Stephen Fleming was disappointed in the way his team fielded and termed their loss against Kolkata Knight Riders as a ‘slap in the face’. Fleming feels that they have been fortunate to have won the keys moments in the season so far and wants the team to continue their winning run of form.

If one team that has been thoroughly dominant this season, it has been Chennai Super Kings and the team currently stay at the top of the table with 12 points. While their bowling failed to fire in some matches, they easily won the battle thanks to their consistent batting displays. However, they couldn't seize the momentum completely yesterday and lost the match to KKR by 6 wickets.

Surprisingly, Ravindra Jadeja, who is one of the better fielders in the Indian team, dropped Sunil Narine on two consecutive deliveries from K Asif. Fleming felt such instances take a toll on the bowler as well. After the drops, Asif was smashed for 21 runs in the 15th over, which aligned the match in KKR’s favour. This might be the reason Fleming didn’t seem too keen on making changes in the bowling unit.

“We know we are not strong in that area and it got exposed. That some good fielders made mistakes also led to the heads going down a little bit,” said Fleming after Kolkata Knight Riders won in 17.4 overs.

Fleming described this season as the toughest to date as the teams have been smart with their picks. However, he felt that everything came down to key moments and they have been fortunate to have won many of them.

“We are not that good a side that we can have bad days and still get away with wins…I think it is a very tight competition, perhaps the tightest season to date with teams very smartly put together. It comes down to key moments. Fortunately for us, we are in a good position because we have won some key moments. But we have to keep winning those,” he said.

“Jadeja needed to go for more than run-a-ball at the death. And they bowled well.”

KKR had an interesting strategy to go with spinners in the fag end of the innings. Piyush Chawla went for 15 runs in the last over and Kuldeep Yadav gave 12 runs in the 18th over of the match. But it was Sunil Narine who halted the flow of runs by giving just four runs in the 19th over.

“Narine is a quality bowler even at the start and he is so at the end too. He stunted momentum. If you win, you just keep riding that momentum but a loss just gives a slap in the face and, hopefully, it will have an effect in a day-and-a-half’s time,” he said.

CSK play their next match against RCB, who have got two wins in a row, in Pune on Saturday.