Rajkot (Gujarat) [India], January 14 : Following his side's loss to New Zealand in the second ODI, Indian skipper Shubman Gill reflected on his team's lack of wickets in the middle overs and concluded that the Men in Blue could have been much more brave with the ball in that particular phase of the game.
Despite two early wickets, a batting masterclass from Daryl Mitchell (131*) and Will Young (87) sunk India to a seven-wicket loss against New Zealand, as they chased down 285 successfully with 15 balls to go. KL Rahul's brilliant 112* in 92 went in vain as an exciting series decider is set up for Sunday.
Speaking during the post-match presentation, Mitchell said, "We could not pick up any wickets in the middle overs. With five fielders in, if you do not keep taking wickets in the middle overs, it becomes very difficult, even if we had added 15-20 more runs. And if you do not pick up wickets in the middle overs, it is very difficult to stop a batsman. On these kinds of wickets, you know, as soon as you have a partnership, the set batsman has to make it big because it is not easy for the batsman coming in to score freely. In the end, we did not get a decent target on the board, and we bowled exceptionally well in the first 10 overs."
Gill said that after getting two early wickets, they were trying to "squeeze" Kiwis batters and put them under pressure since in the first 10 or 15 overs, while bowling, the ball was doing its tricks.
"But I think after the 20-25 overs, the wicket may be settled in a little bit, but I think we could have been a little bit braver while bowling in the middle overs. We could have taken a few more chances," he added.
Reflecting on dropped catches, particularly Prasidh Krishna's dropped catch of Mitchell, Gill said that the team is trying to get better at their fielding.
"If you do not take your chances, in this format, it always makes you lose," he concluded.
Coming to the match, NZ opted to bowl first after winning the toss. Rohit Sharma (24 in 38 balls, with four boundaries) and skipper Shubman Gill (56 in 53 balls, with nine fours and a six) started off well with a 70-run opening stand, but they lost their way courtesy of a fine spell of Kristian Clarke (3/56), which removed Rohit, Virat and Shreyas Iyer. KL's 73-run stand with Ravindra Jadeja (27) and a 57-run stand with Nitish Kumar Reddy (20) took India to 284/7 in 50 overs.
During the run-chase, NZ lost their two wickets for 43 runs, but a 162-run stand between Mitchell (131* in 117 balls, with 11 fours and two sixes) and Young (87 in 98 balls, with seven fours) and another partnership between Mitchell and Glenn Phillips (32* in 25 balls, with two fours and a six) of 78 runs ended the match on a one-sided manner, with Mitchell getting the 'Player of the Match' award.
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