India skipper Shubman Gill rued his team’s inability to pick wickets in the middle overs as New Zealand bounced back to level the three-match ODI series 1-1 with a comprehensive seven-wicket victory in Rajkot on Wednesday (January 14).
While the Men in Blue won the series opener in Vadodara by four wickets, they failed to defend a target of 285 at the Niranjan Shah Stadium.
Daryl Mitchell’s unbeaten 131 overshadowed KL Rahul’s 112* as the Kiwis overhauled the target with 15 deliveries to spare, setting up a series-decider on Sunday (January 18) in Indore.
“We couldn’t pick up any wickets in the middle overs. With five fielders in, if you don’t keep taking wickets in the middle overs, it becomes very difficult even if we would have added 15-20 more runs. And if you don’t pick up wickets in the middle overs, it’s very difficult to stop a target,” Gill said while speaking at the post-match presentation ceremony.
“On these kind of wickets, as soon as you have a partnership, the set batsman has to make it big because it’s not easy for the batsman coming in to score freely. In the end, we did get a decent target on the board and we bowled exceptionally well in the first 10 overs. And the kind of start that we got in the bowling, we were trying to squeeze them down, put them under pressure, but I think they batted really well in the middle overs,” he added.
Gill said while the pitch became easier to bat on under the lights, the Indian bowlers could have been “a little bit more brave” in the middle overs and taken more chances.
“In the first 10-15 overs that we bowled, the ball was doing a little bit. But I think after the 20-25 overs, the wicket maybe settled in a little bit, but I think we could have been a little bit more brave while bowling in the middle overs. We could have taken a little bit more chances,” the captain remarked.
“Even in the last match, we let down a couple of chances. It’s one thing that, we are always, especially with this team, we are always trying to get better at fielding. It’s one aspect that we’re always trying to get better at. And yes, if you don’t take your chances, in this format, it always makes you lose,” Gill concluded.
