Virat Kohli was an elated captain as Team India registered an emphatic eight-wicket victory over Scotland at Dubai International Cricket Stadium on Friday (November 5).
Opting to bowl first, India skittled out Scotland for a meagre 85 in 17.4 overs and then chased down the target in just 6.3 overs to take their net run-rate above New Zealand and Afghanistan.
With this thumping victory, the Men in Blue also kept their semi-final hopes alive and they will now hope that Afghanistan beat New Zealand on Sunday (November 7) in their Super 12 clash in Abu Dhabi.
“A dominating performance, something that we were striving to do again. Now it will be interesting to see what happens on 7th (November). Don't want to say a lot about today's performance, we know what we can do. Also tells you how important the toss can be at this venue. We wanted to get them under 110-120 max, that was the mindset we went in with. The bowlers were excellent, and then KL and Rohit did really well,” Kohli said at the post-match presentation ceremony.
Left-arm spinner Ravindra Jadeja and speedster Mohammad Shami (3-15) starred with the ball as they claimed three wickets each by conceding only 15 runs. Jasprit Bumrah (2-10) and R Ashwin (1-29) also returned with impressive figures.
In reply, India needed to chase down the total in 7.1 overs to better their net run-rate but the opening blitz from KL Rahul (50 off 19 balls) and Rohit Sharma (30 off 16 balls) took them over the line four balls earlier.
“We spoke about the 8-10 over bracket before the start, didn't want to really go too hard because if you lose wickets, then an extra 20 balls could cost. We thought that if they play naturally, runs will come quickly,” Kohli stated.
“If you look at our practice games, we have been actually batting like this only. Just a couple of aberrations happened, where we just couldn't got those two successive good overs. Teams bowled well too, and created pressure on us. But we were just two overs of good batting. Jadeja bowled really well, also Shami was quite good,” he further remarked.
India will take on Namibia in their last Super 12 match in Dubai on Monday (November 8).
(Quotes from Cricbuzz)
