Despite grabbing a hat-trick in his debut Indian Premier League (IPL) T20 game for Gujarat Lions on Friday, Australian Andrew Tye said his first choice is the traditional format of the game.
The 30-year-old returned with figures of 5/17 to guide the Gujarat Lions to a seven-wicket win over the Rising Pune Supergiant in a home game at the Saurashtra Cricket Association Stadium here.
“It’s a good format of cricket, but traditionally, I would still love to play Test cricket. The slower ball worked very well for me,” Tye, who was adjudged the Man-of-the-Match, said after the match.
“Every wicket is different around the world, so you have to assess conditions to find out which ball works where” he added.
Elated after registering their first victory in the IPL 2017, Gujarat skipper Suresh Raina said it took a lot of heart to bounce back after the losses in the initial two games.
“I think when we lost two games, it was difficult for us to come back strongly,” Raina said.
Heaping praises on Tye’s brilliant effort with the ball, Raina said: “I thought Andrew bowled brilliantly. He is a very smart cricketer who varies his pace, especially in the death overs.”
“Jason Roy missed out today (Friday), but then Brendon (McCullum) and (Dwayne) Smith did it for us. They have done it for CSK and they did it again today,” he added.
Visiting skipper Steve Smith had no qualms over the nature of the wicket and blamed his side’s regular fall of wickets for the loss.
“I don’t think that wicket really changed over the course of 40 overs. It was a pretty good wicket,” Smith said.
“We got ourselves into a good position but lost a few wickets in clumps and we weren’t good enough tonight. The surface played better than we thought it would.”
Hailing Gujarat’s opening duo of Dwayne Smith and Brendon McCullum for their brilliant strokeplay, Smith said: “When Dwayne and McCullum get going, it’s hard to stop them and we could not come back after that.”
With Pune playing their second IPL, the 27-year-old Australian acknowledged the problems of leading a new side which does not have a settled playing XI.
“One of the disadvantages of being a new team, Gujarat are in the same boat, we are still trying to find out our best XI. A few guys put their hands up tonight, which was good,” he said.
(IANS)
