India’s stand-in skipper Rohit Sharma had no excuses for India’s poor performance against Hong Kong in their opening game of the Asia Cup 2018 but reckons that his team is willing to learn from their mistakes.
During the post-match presentation ceremony, Rohit said, “We always knew it was not going to be easy. There are no excuses. We made our mistakes. This tournament is all about learning and these guys will learn. But in the end, the team pulled it back.”
The skipper also pointed out the performance of Shikhar Dhawan and Ambati Rayudu for praise. The former scored a century while the latter got a well-hit fifty. Even the debutant, Khaleel Ahmed was impressive, as the southpaw seamer finished the game with figures of 3 for 48 despite not starting the game in an ideal manner.
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Praising his played, Rohit said, “This will be a great learning curve for the bowling group. Shikhar was a great positive. It was not easy out there. Amabati got a brilliant fifty as well. Khaleel is a very exciting player to have in our squad. Today, he showed that despite not starting well he found a way to come back and got his rewards in the end.”
It was largely because of Shikhar Dhawan’s 120-ball 127 and Rayudu’s 70-ball 60 India managed to reach the decent total of 285 for 7 in their 50 overs. In reply, Hong Kong, who were bowled out for 116 in their first game against Pakistan, got off to a best possible start with openers – Nizakat Khan (92) and Anshuman Rath (73) – adding 174 for the first wicket. However, soon after the dismissal of the HK skipper, the minnows’ batting line-up fell like dominos and India managed to survive a scare.
Talking about his knock, Dhawan said, “We didn’t expect that they were going to score a 174-run partnership. Both the opening batsmen played really well. The way they played their shots and the way they were calculative about scoring runs, it was good. I have to appreciate their good batting as well. There wasn’t much of a swing or seam on the wicket. And at the same time, Khaleel bowled really well. Of course we couldn’t get the wicket at the start but later on the way, we came back in the game and the way our fast bowlers or spinners as well, they both took wickets, that was good.”
Until the 35th over of Hong Kong’s chase, it looked like Nizakat and Rath would take the game away from India but Dhawan and his team knew all they needed was just one wicket.
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Dhawan described, “We knew that once we get the top-order wickets, we can come back in the game. Obviously, they gave a decent fight and it is always good to learn from every match. It’s good that we played this game and built pressure. Tomorrow (against Pakistan) is going to be a big pressure game, so that pressure (against Hong Kong) will actually help tomorrow.”
Justifying the selections for their tournament opener, Rohit asserted that they were required by the schedule, with India set to face Pakistan on Wednesday. He said that due to the scheduling of the back-to-back games, they have decided to rest a few players.
