KL Rahul, who played a scintillating knock of 40-ball 62 to script India’s 6-wicket win in the first T20I against West Indies in Hyderabad, has insisted that he is not worried about sealing his T20 World Cup berth and is right now focused only on making the best use of opening opportunity.
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The Karnataka batsman has got an opportunity to bat at the top as regular opener Shikhar Dhawan sustained a knee injury while playing in the recently held Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy for Delhi.
"It's (T20 World Cup) a long way honestly. I have got the opportunity to bat top of the order again after a couple of series, so looking forward to just making the best use of it," Rahul said at the post-match press conference.
"Today was a good outing, good hit in the middle and hopefully I can continue the same thing without worrying about October next year. There are a lot of games before that."
Although both the teams scored 200+ runs in the T20I series opener, Rahul felt it wasn't the easiest track to bat on.
"The wicket wasn't bad, both teams scored 200 plus and we chased it in 19 overs but it wasn't the easiest wicket to bat on," he remarked.
The 27-year-old shared an entertaining 100-run stand for the second wicket with Virat Kohli, who played a masterful knock of 50-ball 94* to guide the hosts over the line with 8 balls to spare while chasing a colossal 208.
Speaking about his partnership with the skipper, Rahul said: "When you are chasing 200 plus obviously you want to come out hard so sometimes you don't hold your shape.
"So in the middle 2-3 overs we obviously got it harder to get the boundaries but we knew that once we get a few boundaries it will start, so we just had to stay patient. We just kept the intent going. Our plans were very clear that you have to hit boundaries while chasing 200 runs.
"It obviously was a bit tricky but the best chance for a batsman to score runs was once you are set. Fortunately Virat carried on and finished the game for us," he explained.
India might have won the game but they were far from impressive on the field with Rohit Sharma and Washington Sundar dropping a few catches.
Rahul said for a fielder it wasn't easy to pick the ball with low flood lights at the ground.
"I don't think it's the dimensions of the ground, I think the lights are pretty low and sometimes you lose the ball in that light and that's what happened a couple of times," he said.
"We have played here before, we have played here for years so we knew what to expect. As a team we don't complain about things like these, it's not in our control."
Thiruvananthapuram will host the second T20I of the series on Sunday (December 8).
(With PTI inputs)
