Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) captain Eoin Morgan heaped praise on his opener, Venkatesh Iyer, after his outstanding innings against Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) in the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL 2021) in Abu Dhabi, UAE.
On Monday, September 20, Iyer played a brilliant knock of unbeaten 41 off 34 balls laced with 6 fours and one six and added 82 runs with Shubman Gill (48) for the first wicket to help KKR win the game by nine wickets against RCB, as Kolkata chased down 93 runs in just 10 overs in Abu Dhabi.
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With the massive victory, KKR has jumped to the fifth position in the IPL 2021 points table. After the game, the KKR skipper Morgan said Iyer's knock was a treat to watch and has shown the brand of cricket the franchise wants to play in the remainder of the IPL 14 in the UAE.
Morgan said during a virtual post-match press conference: “Venkatesh Iyer, the way he came in and played was outstanding. Certainly, the brand of cricket we want to play. Playing under head coach Brendon McCullum, this is the aggressive nature of cricket we want to play. Although he was aggressive, he managed to control his innings. His opening partnership with Shubman Gill was beautiful to watch.”
Meanwhile, the KKR spinner Varun Chakravarthy returned with figures of 3/13 while Andre Russell also snared three wickets to help the side restrict the RCB to 92 inside 19 overs on Monday.
Praising the bowling efforts, the skipper said: “Yeah, I think the match-ups with Russell really worked. The pitch the way it played throughout the whole innings was more seamer-friendly even though Varun had an unbelievable day. I thought the pitch assisted the seamers with big size boundaries.”
However, Morgan admitted that the road ahead will be challenging for the KKR in the ongoing IPL 2021, but they just need to continue to play the way they played against RCB to make it to the playoffs.
He signed off by saying, “Yeah, there is no doubt that it will be a challenge from here onwards, but our main aim is to turn up and play cricket as we did with RCB. If we do that, then we give ourselves the best chance of progressing to the playoffs.”
Notably, KKR will next lock horns against Mumbai Indians on Thursday, September 23 in Abu Dhabi.
(With ANI Inputs)
