Ahmedabad: After Mohit Sharma picked a brilliant 3-25 in Gujarat Titans’ seven-wicket win over Sunrisers Hyderabad at the Narendra Modi Stadium, captain Shubman Gill credited the veteran fast-bowler for having the confidence to execute his skills, which he practices earnestly in the nets.
In the afternoon, on a two-paced black soil pitch, Mohit was impressive with his cutters and slower deliveries, including offering great control in the back end of the innings to keep SRH to a below-par 162/8, which GT chased down in the last over to make it two out of two wins at their home ground.
“He’s such an experienced player, especially on wickets like these. He comes in day in day out, he practices his skills and he’s so skilled. It’s not easy in this heat to bowl four overs back-to-back, sometimes three overs back-to-back. But he comes in, bowls those yorkers, slower ones, and mixes it so well.”
“The credit has to go to him for practising those skills and to be able to have the confidence to execute them in the match. In this heat, wherever we play in the day match, it’s easier to score with the new ball. Once the ball gets old and the wickets get slow, it’s difficult to hit those sixes, especially on the longer side and that was our plan – to be able to let them hit the slower ones on the longer side,” said Gill after the match ended.
Operating in overs 17-20 for GT since joining their camp in the IPL, Mohit has picked 17 wickets at an economy rate of 8.13, including 41 dot balls. He was well-supported by Azmatullah Omarzai, Rashid Khan, Noor Ahmad, and Umesh Yadav taking one wicket each.
“To be able to win two matches at home, great. Our next match is also here and then we’ve got a couple of matches on the road. Hopefully, by the time we come back, we will have good momentum into this tournament. Credit to the bowlers how they came in and restricted them to that total.”
“The way our bowlers bowled in the middle overs, especially Noor. Obviously, Rashid bhai is a world-class bowler and he’s always coming in and giving his best, but the way Darshan (Nalkande) came in and bowled those two crucial overs at the death was very important for us,” added Gill.
In chasing 163, Sudarshan overcame a slow start on a two-paced pitch to make 45 off 36 balls, while Miller fought through pain in his leg to be unbeaten on 44 off 27 deliveries. Gill also had a slow start but made 36 before holing out to long-on off Mayank Markande.
“The ball was there to be hit, I was just backing my shot, but the ball hit the bottom and it didn’t bounce as much as I expected it to but that’s fine (on his dismissal). In T20, you have to always keep your options open and if the ball is there, you have to go for it. Once we saw how our spinners were bowling, we thought 160-170 would be a good score.”
“Everybody knows their roles in terms of batting or bowling, Sai has been playing well, Wriddhi bhai has been doing what Wriddhi bhai does and it was important for us to be able to get Miller back in form. Just cramps (which hampered Miller in the chase),” concluded Gill.
Sunrisers Hyderabad skipper Pat Cummins felt his team fell short by 10-15 runs with the bat. For SRH, all of their top seven batters made beyond 15, but none of them could go past 30, while GT had their top four batters making more than 25.
“Good game of cricket was tight in the end, probably we needed 10-15 more runs. I think they bowled well, just losing a couple of wickets, didn’t have that one person who kicked on to get a fifty, that happens.”
“Today it was, we thought the wicket was going to get a bit slow, the off-cutters did grip, and we had 8 bowling options in our side. I thought the wicket played the same in both innings. It’s T20 cricket, isn’t it? Had a fantastic couple of games with the bat, today we didn’t quite click.”
With two wins from both of their home matches, IPL 2022 winners GT will next host the Shikhar Dhawan-led Punjab Kings at the Narendra Modi Stadium on Thursday evening. SRH, on the other hand, will host defending champions Chennai Super Kings at their home ground in Hyderabad on Friday evening.
–IANS