Nicholas Pooran starred with the bat in Lucknow Super Giants’ (LSG) thrilling one-wicket victory over Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) at Chinnaswamy Stadium on Monday (April 10).
Chasing 213 to win, the visitors were reeling at 105/5 in the 12th over before Pooran took the RCB attack to the cleaners.
The southpaw slammed 62 in just 19 balls and added 84 runs for the sixth wicket with Ayush Badoni (30 off 24) to keep LSG in the chase, which was eventually sealed on the last delivery by a pair of Avesh Khan and Ravi Bishnoi.
After the game, Pooran, who earned the Player-of-the-Match award, credited the brilliant last over bowled by pacer Mark Wood for LSG’s victory.
Wood conceded only 9 runs off the final over and also claimed the prized scalp of a rampaging Glenn Maxwell.
“Obviously, I thought it was a really good cricket pitch. Mark Wood bowled an excellent last over and kept us in the game. Tonight wasn’t a surprise to me. We just felt like it was a good cricket pitch, small boundaries,” said Pooran, while citing that a target of around 220 would have put his side under pressure.
“I think, psychologically, chasing 220-odd would have put additional pressure on us, but 213 we felt like the momentum was on our side, It was just that we needed to get that start.”
Nicholas Pooran also praised the RCB bowlers while also adding that every team in the IPL now bats deep and a couple of good partnerships can change the course of the game.
“Credit must be given to RCB bowlers Parnell and Siraj; they obviously landed their fullest punch. But, it’s a game of cricket. Everyone has a long batting order and the partnership between KL (Rahul) and Marcus (Stoinis), they batted really well, especially Stoinis… obviously changing the game for us, given us some momentum,” he stated.
At one stage in the chase, Super Giants were 23/3 before Marcus Stoinis produced a blazing knock of 30-ball 65 to bail the team out of trouble.
According to Pooran, the score was gettable and he wanted to take on the RCB right from the outset.
“It (score) was definitely gettable. Eventually, I didn’t think about the situation (when I came in to bat) tonight. I just felt like I wanted to get in my zone and want to hit a couple out of the park and that got me going, to be honest. I just felt like I had to take that chance against the leg-spinner to get my innings going and I felt like everything just flowed for me after that,” the left-hander said.
“Even when (Ayush) Badoni came, he played really well and we were scoring boundaries, scoring at 10-runs an over and in a blink of an eye, the game changes that fast. So, we were able to control the game for a couple of overs from there. We brought down the scoring (rate) from 14 to 10.”
However, Pooran was disappointed with himself for not staying till the end to take his team over the finishing line.
“I got out at the wrong time. Again something, I obviously want to get better at, winning games and playing till the end. Tonight, I fell short and I feel disappointed about that, but happy that we could get the ‘W’,” he said.
(With PTI Inputs)
