Nagpur, (DHNS): Skipper MS Dhoni squarely blamed batting failure for the home team’s 47-run loss in the World T20 opener against New Zealand here on Tuesday night.
Chasing New Zealand’s 126 for seven, India crashed to 79 all out to open their campaign on woeful note.
“I think the dismissals of our batsmen, there were quite a few soft dismissals,” said Dhoni when asked about India’s debacle. “And there were no partnerships at all which was what needed when you have to score 125 odd runs while chasing. We all knew the wicket was slightly on the slower side but the good thing is we still restricted them to a good score. I think 140 would have been a par score on this wicket, so bowlers did a good job while restricting them to 126,” he reasoned.
Losing wickets at regular intervals, Dhoni felt, put pressure on the middle-order. “I felt it was the batting department,” he stressed again. “I think we lost a wicket every alternate over and it becomes more and more difficult once the top order gets out (cheaply). The batsmen who come after that – let’s talk about 5, 6 and 7 – they will have the pressure of losing an extra wicket.
“It seems as though cricket becomes very difficult but what’s important that time is to get some kind of partnership going. I feel it was to some extent lack of application. There were a few good deliveries but I think it had to do with soft dismissals.”
New Zealand skipper Kane Williamson was pleased with the performance of his side.”It was a tough surface. With the bat whatever score was going to be tough. We wanted to be aggressive at the start, the format dictates that, we may reflect on that though,” he said.