Sai Sudharsan and Prasidh lead GT to the top of the IPL table
They posted 217 and defended it with aplomb in dew-free conditions in Ahmedabad despite a fighting fifty from Hetmyer
They posted 217 and defended it with aplomb in dew-free conditions in Ahmedabad despite a fighting fifty from Hetmyer
Scorer: Ranjith P | Commentator: S Sudarshanan
There you go. Another dominant show from GT takes them to the top of the pile. Problems galore for RR. That's all we have for you from Ahmedabad tonight. On behalf of Ranjith and Himanshu, this is Sudarshanan bidding you goodbye. Goodnight, take care! Ciao!
11:25pm A massive batting failure sees RR lose their third match in five outings. Only three batters managed to get into double digits on a surface that was still batting friendly. But GT never made it seem that way. Arshad and Siraj were incisive with the new ball. Samson and Parag found their shots but it was not long before they were dismissed. Apart from those two and Hetmyer, none of the batters seemed to look the part.
Prasidh found a nice length in the middle of the surface and finished with three wickets. He constantly tested the batters with lengths and picked up all his wickets with the short balls. It means GT go to the top of the table with eight points.
Sanju Samson, RR captain: "We gave away 15-20 runs extra in the bowling. When we needed momentum we lost wickets. With Hettie, sixes and four kept coming. But I lost my wicket and that's where we lost the game. The way Jofra started was good, he picked up Shubman's wicket. Then we went off plan. We planned something but they executed something else. We will have to look at that tomorrow. When you lose games, we also feel should we have chased? Should we have done something else? But we want to be a team that wins games while chasing, not just win batting first."
Prasidh Krishna: "The work we put in is showing. Great team effort, lovely we got a win. There was some extra bounce in the wicket, so thought of making use of it. The motto is to be adaptable and read the pitch early. Honestly it doesn't feel like somebody is not picking wickets. T20 is not about having a great over but about just one ball - if you can keep the last ball quiet, some other bowler faces the next over. Not much dew here, we played a couple of practice games, there was no dew."
Shubman Gill, GT captain: "Good total put up. It was not easy, the first three fours overs, it was nipping. Sai and Jos batted tremendously. We'd take 220 any day. Our fast bowlers doing a tremendous job. Everyone is chipping in. If you are difficulties in choosing the Player of the Match, that is the hallmark of everyone chipping in. When you have bowlers like we do, captaincy becomes easy. Whosoever I bring in, they are happy to contribute. We have Ishi bhai, who has played 100 Tests for us, everyone is nice."
Sai Sudharsan, Player of the Match: "IPL is a tournament where you need momentum at the start. Joy to contribute and make the team win. At the start, the wicket was seaming. We cannot take a lot of time, so made use of the second half of the powerplay. Our goal was to have a lot of wickets in hand, it worked well. There is awareness. We are clear on what to do. If we lose wickets early, a set batter has to play. If we give the hitters the right platform, we can make use of the last five-seven overs. I always try to look at what I can do better. I am trying to improve my awareness and skill. I feel I work a lot on basics that is helping me a versatile batter."
Saifi: "Samson has been making fatal mistakes as a skipper that causes RR the matches. Jofra Archer was the only bowler who didn't let RR batters get away with his fiery spell and he was removed by Samson. He perhaps wanted to save his overs for death but it was little too late when he returned with ball. Poor captaincy " Also a case of trying to extract the additional wicket earlier
M Theekshana c Sai Sudharsan b Sai Kishore 5 (20m 13b 0x4 0x6) SR: 38.46
Sai Kishore for the final over of the game, slip in
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