It was a tough game between India and West Indies at the Barabati Stadium, Cuttack, and India won the game due to the batting efforts of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma along with the contribution of Shardul Thakur with the bat. The no 8. Batsman smashed 17 from six balls and took the team over the finish line. After his match-winning innings, he told the Indian Express, that he prepares for this kind of situations.

“When I was going out to bat, Ravi (Shastri) sir told me to take the responsibility and finish the game. He said, ‘I have the talent to do it’. When I was entering the ground, Virat said it would be better to take a single and give the strike to Jaddu (Ravindra Jadeja). But fortunately for me, I connected the first ball from the middle of the bat. Jaddu had told me that since the dew had settled, the ball was coming on to the bat nicely. After I hit the first-ball four, the pressure on Jadeja also came down, since the asking rate reduced a bit,” Thakur said.

For Shardul Thakur, this was not the first time that he had done with the bat. In IPL 2018, he had built a similar partnership with Faf du Plessis and took CSK home against SRH.

“I have finished the game in IPL, Faf (du Plessis) was batting with me then. I had hit a four in that game too. The important thing in such situations is to stay on the crease and rotate the strike. I have been in such a situation before, so it helps, as I know what I have to do,” he shared.

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Thakur said that Windies bowlers were under pressure because there was dew.

“It depends on your preparation. I do prepare in practice sessions. I do match simulation and imagine myself facing a bowler in the match. But to be honest, I have never imagined myself in such a position. In school cricket I have been part of such games. I feel things get easy once you are mentally prepared. It’s a pressure game, I feel batsmen are always on top in pressure games. While batting, I realised that the bowlers would be in more pressure than me. There is dew and if the bowlers fail to execute their plans, they will pay the price. I was hoping that the bowler failed so that I could take my chance. There is no point in taking pressure on myself,” he said.

“I was part of the team before, somehow I couldn’t fit into the playing eleven. I played a game in South Africa, later played two games in Sri Lanka. Asia Cup I played one game, I have got breaks between games. Positive thing is that I was part of the winning cause. Hopefully, I will get more chances in future. Every cricketer waits for a day like this. This doesn’t happen overnight, a lot of hardwork goes into this. This time it was batting, I hope next time it is bowling,” he concluded.