Cuttack:
India lost second T20I against South Africa as the visitors players spectacularly with bat and ball, both. Indian team is currently trying to finding the best of their players to mark win against Proteas. In one such try, Axar Patel was promoted ahead of Dinesh Karthik when India was put to bat in Barabati Stadium.
When asked for an explanation about the decision, batter Shreyas Iyer clarified that the team needed someone to change strike at that time and not someone who would hit 6s and 4s.
“See, it is definitely something we strategised earlier on as well. We had seven overs left, Axar Patel is someone who can take singles, who can keep rotating the strike and we did not require someone to come in and straight away start hitting from ball one at that point of time. Even DK can do that, obviously but, DK has been a real good asset for us after 15 overs where he can come in and straight away slog the ball,” said Shreyas during a post-match press conference.
The game went on and Patel was dismissed for 10 runs off 11 balls in the 17th over whereas Karthik reamained unbeaten on 30 off 21 balls.
“Even he was finding it difficult today to start on. The wicket played a huge role in today’s game, I feel that strategy we will be utilising in the next game as well, that’s what we have been thriving on. If you see the past games, we have done this move plenty of times so yeah, it is one of those days,” he added.
Indian put a decent total of 148 runs on board but they failed to defend it against Klaasen powered South Africa.
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