Hardik Pandya, Gautam Gambhir and Suryakumar Yadav. Photo- BCCI
Hardik Pandya, Gautam Gambhir and Suryakumar Yadav. Photo- BCCI

Suryakumar Yadav received rich laurels from Gautam Gambhir and Hardik Pandya, who took center stage in the dressing room after Sri Lanka was white-washed 3-0 by the Men in Blue in Kandy on July 30, 2024. India won the first Twenty20 International by 43 runs on Saturday and the second by 7 wickets (DLS) on Sunday.

It was India’s first series triumph under new coach Gautam Gambhir and captain Suryakumar Yadav. It was an excellent start for the T20 World Champions, and after the match, Gautam Gambhir delivered a motivational address to the Indian players in the changing room.

In a video posted by BCCI on its X handle (formerly Twitter), Gautam Gambhir lauded the team for their never-give-up attitude. The head coach stated that the Indian players fought on every delivery and for every run in the recent match.

“Guys congratulations on a great series win. Congratulations to Surya as well, outstanding captaincy and more importantly with the bat as well. Guys, I asked for something before the start of the game and you absolutely delivered it. This is what happens when you keep fighting. You don’t give up. These kind of games happen, and the only way these games can happen is when we keep fighting on every delivery and for every run.

And this was the example we keep getting better, we keep improving our skills as well, because we need to still get better on playing on wickets like these, because we might end up getting these kinds of wickets. So we should first assess the situation and conditions really quickly and what is the par score as well. There is a lot of learning from this game, but more important than not this is a great series win,” Gambhir said.

Suryakumar Yadav, well done!- Hardik Pandya lauds India’s captain for his innovative leadership

Hardik Pandya, who was rested for this match along with Rishabh Pant, Akshar Patel, and Arshdeep Singh, was given a chance to speak as well. Hardik Pandya will not be a part of the Indian ODI team for the Sri Lanka series.

Suryakumar Yadav displayed imaginative thinking on a spin-friendly ground when he bowled Rinku Singh in the 19th over, picking up two wickets for three runs. Surya then came to bowl the final over. He scored 5 runs and got 2 wickets as India drew the match after defending 6 runs in the final over.

Suryakumar then threw the ball to Washington Sundar for the Super Over, who removed both Lankan hitters for two runs. India won thanks to Suryakumar’s four on the opening ball. He received praise from Hardik Pandya, who was snubbed by BCCI for T20I captaincy.

Pandya also lauded Suryakumar Yadav for his captaincy saying, “As Gauti bhai mentioned, Surya, well done on making sure that the way you rotated the bowlers, making sure, showing faith in the bowlers, which you gave in the last couple of overs. That was brilliant. And as a bowling group, obviously it was fantastic everyone chipped in. Washi, well done buddy. When you win games like this, eventually it kind of takes us forward. We are taking step by step. But this was definitely a right step going forward for the future and well done to all the guys who are playing ODIs, kill it! Continue!”

Here is the video:

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