After losing the thrilling Visakhapatnam T20I against Australia, Indian pacer Jasprit Bumrah defended MS Dhoni, who denied some crucial singles during the first innings.
While the Indian opener Rohit Sharma (5) lost his wicket at very early, another opener KL Rahul and the skipper Virat Kohli‘s 55-run partnership helped India to get a good start. However, once that partnership was broken, the host side kept losing wickets at regular intervals.
Apart from KL Rahul (50) and Virat Kohli (24), only MS Dhoni reached the double-digit scores in that innings as India managed 126/7 in 20 overs. Though MS Dhoni played a crucial knock of unbeaten 29 runs off 37 balls, his slow knock has come under the scanner. When the wicketkeeper-batsman was batting with the tail-enders, he refused to take around eight singles. In the end, it became costly as Australia chased that target on the very last ball of the match.
I think we fell short by 15-20 runs – Jasprit Bumrah
MS Dhoni was trying to face more balls in that situation but failed to play big shots. Though Jasprit Bumrah feels that they were a little short, he also thinks that 126 was still the fighting total.
After end of the match, Jasprit Bumrah said, “We were trying our best. We were figuring out. He was trying to take the game deep and get us to a safe total which we tried. I think we fell short by 15-20 runs but he still gave us a fighting total. We had something we could fight on so that was the plan which he was trying to execute.
“We almost pulled off this game but on this wicket around 140-145 would have been a very good score because there was no bounce and it was difficult to play big shots. So it’s always tough to chase totals on these wickets.”
I’ve been just focusing on my strengths – Jasprit Bumrah
Jasprit Burmah bowled brilliantly in this game, and that helped India to return to the game. The right-arm pacer had the bowling figures of 4-0-16-3 as the visiting side found very challenging to chase that target.
Speaking about his bowling, Jasprit Burmah said that he was focusing on his strength. He also believes that the pitch was not favorable for the shot takers.
The Indian pacer said, “I’ve been just focussing on what my strengths are. The wicket was a little difficult to bat on; it was not easy to go heavily on this wicket because to play big shots on this sluggish wicket was a bit difficult. So I was just figuring out my options, what I should do and I was trying to execute that.”
With this victory, Australia has taken 1-0 lead in the two-match T20I series with one to go. India and Australia will play the second and final T20I of the series on Wednesday (27 February) at Bengaluru.