On Sunday, India's cricket squad suffered a disappointing performance in the second T20I against South Africa in Cuttack. The bowlers were unable to create anything extraordinary after the hosts' batting had piled up 148/6 in 20 overs, as the Proteas reached the target in 18.2 overs.
Only Bhuvneshwar Kumar bowled well, getting 4/13 in four overs, but the rest of India's bowlers were expensive. Yuzvendra Chahal was the most expensive, returning with numbers of 4-0-49-1. Heinrich Klassen 81 (46) struck Chahal for three sixes in the 16th over, resulting in 23 runs.
Former India captain Sunil Gavaskar believes it was a “psychological blow" for Chahal.
“It's a psychological blow for the next game as well. In the next game, Chahal will be thinking about what line he should be bowling. May be give the ball bit of air, or should he be bowling slightly wide off the arc. All these things will be something that Chahal will have to think about,” Gavaskar said on Star Sports after the match.
“Or, the Indian bowlers as well. They just have one day before the next game. Tomorrow is a travel day. This is what they need to look into. It's the bowling that needs to tighten up a little bit because when they are conceding runs, they are conceding 13-15 runs in an over. When you are conceding two boundaries in an over but overall, you are conceding eight or nine, that's still okay. Looking at something like conceding something like 13, 15, 20…that becomes difficult then.”
In the encounter, Klaasen scored his career-best T20I score of 81 as South Africa defeated India by four wickets on a challenging field to grab a 2-0 lead in the five-match T20I series here on Sunday.
Klaasen made it look deceptively easy in his 46-ball knock, smashing seven fours and five huge sixes to help his team chase down a target of 149 with 10 balls to spare on a two-paced track where most batters struggled.
