Despite having England on the back foot, Indian captain Suryakumar Yadav acknowledged that they could not clean up the tail. Adil Rashid was the main actor behind making life miserable for Indian batters during India’s 26-run loss in the third T20I match on Tuesday in Rajkot. The 20 overs saw England post 171/9, resuming play at 127/8 after 16 overs. India still faltered in their chase, with a score of 145/9 which was 26 short of England’s tally.
“I thought there would be dew that might help a bit later on in the innings. I felt when Hardik and Axar were batting we had the game in our hands. Adil Rashid bowled well, that’s why he’s world-class. He didn’t allow us to rotate the strike,” Suryakumar said in the post-match presentation.
“I think from a T20 game you learn something always, I think from being at 127/8 and going up to around 170, we definitely let the game slip somewhere. I think we have to learn from a batting point of view. If we had to go back to the drawing board, we must learn from our mistakes.”
England started their innings decisively, with Duckett leading the assault with a brisk 76-run partnership with skipper Jos Buttler, whose innings contributed 24 runs off 22 balls. In fact, after having placed England at 83/2, the visitors fell to within 127/8 before Rashid and Mark Wood garnered a respectable score of 171/9.
Jos Buttler, the England captain, alluded to his team’s habit of losing wickets en masse but praised the tail-enders’ efforts in pushing the total higher, along with the bowlers’ continuing performance in moments that mattered most.
“He did very well together with his team, demonstrating his skills. They are very cool under pressure; it’s not about speed, but how well they can adjust to the pitch,” Buttler said.
“Rashid is a very important player for England and one we were lucky to have,” Buttler said. “With all variations, staying calm and keeping the run rate down is what it develops from Jofra; he might give a six but will… definitely come back.” Speaking about the batting performance of his team, Buttler said, “I think it looked a different wicket; an impressive knock by Duckett. We lost wickets in clusters, which was disappointing; must take wickets within powerplay boundaries.”
“Everybody started thinking about digging in; take it on,” he said. “We got good value out of Rashid and Wood at the end,” added England’s skipper.
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