Bengaluru, April 11 Lucknow Super Giants captain KL Rahul has defended his timid approach in the 213-run chase against Royal Challengers Bangalore in an IPL 2023 game, saying that his team lost three wickets quickly so he was forced to bat cautiously and play according to the situation.
Rahul, who is often criticised for his low strike rate once again, scored 18 off 20 balls before getting out in the 12th over of the game, putting his team in deep trouble.
"Not ideal for me, I want to score more runs and I think if I score more runs, the strike rate goes up. We have played a couple of games on tough wickets in Lucknow. Today we lost three wickets so I went slower. I looked at the situation and felt like I did the right thing and if I could have carried on and stayed there till the end and stayed with Nicky, we could've won the game a lot easier," Rahul said in the post match presentation.
"Once I get some good knocks under my belt I'll start feeling good and that will go up," he added.
Lucknow Super Giants were 37/3 at the end of power-play but Marcus Stoinis brought his side back with his impressive 30-ball 65 while Nicholas Pooran smashed a sensational 19-ball 62, including hitting fastest fifty of the season in 15 balls, to take the team to a last-ball thrilling one-wicket victory in a dramatic match against RCB.
"Unbelievable. This is the Chinnaswamy, the only venue where so many last finishes are possible. From the possible we were in to end up winning in superb," Rahul said.
"When you are chasing 210 + you need to go hard. Sometimes you lose wickets but the ball was swinging a bit early for them and they got wickets. That puts some pressure on you but the way Stoinis and Pooran played was brilliant. The reason we have got 2 points here is because of the way they batted," he added.
The LSG skipper also called the batting in the lower middle order as the most difficult thing in T20 cricket and lauded young Badoni.
"Batting 5 ,6, 7 is the toughest position to play and that's where games are won and lost. We know about the power in Marcus and Nicky, and Ayush has come along as well. He's played 2-3 knocks last year, and he's continued to perform well for us,"
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