IPL 2019 | Happy with bowlers despite loss, asserts Bhuvneshwar Kumar

04/09/2019

Bhuvneshwar Kumar, after his team SRH’s loss against KXIP, has stated that he is happy with the performance of his bowlers, taking in the dew factor. KXIP were cruising in their chase of 151, but three quick wickets put SRH back into the game which they eventually lost with a ball remaining.

Sunrisers Hyderabad were struggling with that bat in the first ten overs, being able to manage only 50 runs. But they made a comeback in the latter half of their innings, and posted a respectable 150 on the board. But with the dew on the field, the Sunrisers’ bowling attack had their work cut out.

Despite that, they dismissed the big hitting Chris Gayle in the third over for 16 runs, but a 100 run partnership between KL Rahul and Mayank Agarwal followed. Eventually, only 19 runs were required in three overs, with 9 wickets remaining, which nearly ended all hopes for the 2016 champions. However, Sandeep Sharma struck back with two wickets in the 18th over, followed by Siddharth Kaul’s strike in the 19th over. This took the equation to 11 runs off the last over, but unfortunately for SRH, they lost with one ball to spare.

However, the skipper Bhuvneshwar Kumar was delighted with his bowler’s efforts, who stuck to their plans and did not give an inch to the Kings’ batsmen.

“Of course it is hard but I am pretty happy with the way we bowled with the dew around. It is a bit difficult with yorkers and slower balls, but given the dew, we executed our plans pretty well,” Kumar said, at the post match presentation ceremony, reported PTI.

The IS Bindra stadium in Mohali is known for it’s huge boundaries, thereby the SRH skipper chalked his plans with this factor in his mind. The skipper justified his bowler’s stand by stating that bowlers cannot always bowl yorkers, and lauded their efforts which took the relatively low scoring match to the last over.

“The yorker is something you can't bowl and the bowling plans depend on the length of the boundaries. When we came to bowl we kept the dew factor out of our minds and all we wanted to do was stretch it to the last over,” remarked the 29 year old.

The Orange Army have a nearly week long break as they will face Delhi Capitals in their next encounter on April 14,, and the skipper suggested that this time will be used to assess their performance until now.

“It is a good thing to get a break now, we can assess what we have done so far,” concluded Kumar.

On the other hand, the Man of the Match KL Rahul was delighted to have his form back, and win a match for his team, especially after his struggle in the previous game, where he scored a sluggish 55 off 47.

“Didn't start off the way I wanted to in the first couple of games. Just enjoying my batting and happy to end up on the winning side,” expressed Rahul.

The right hander has been playing alongside Chris Gayle since 2016, first in Royal Challengers Bangalore, and now in KXIP. The batsman was all praise for the West Indian and his Indian counterpart Mayank Agarwal, who has been having a good run in this edition, with 184 runs in six matches, and also played a vital role in this match, scoring 55 off 43 deliveries.

“Been playing with Chris for a long time and really enjoy batting with Mayank. The batting group has done well so far. The way Mayank came out and the way he was striking, even against Mumbai gives me a little bit of time,” the 26 year old remarked.

Sam Curran, who was drafted in as an all-rounder, has also been splendid with both the bat and ball. The 20 year old came in a tight situation in the last over, and managed to score twos in each of his first two balls, before taking a single and handing over the strike to Rahul. The Karnataka batsman shared that he had suggested Curran to target the gaps, as to counter the huge boundaries.

“I did tell him (Curran) that maybe hitting six is difficult. I told him to target the pockets,” signed off Rahul.