Veteran New Zealand pace bowler Mitchell McClenaghan shared that the cheap dismissals of Suryakumar Yadav and Rishabh Pant hurt Team India in the first ODI against New Zealand in Auckland on Friday, November 25. While refusing to criticize the Indian openers for not showing aggression, he praised Shikhar Dhawan and Shubman Gill for laying a solid foundation.

While talking about them, McClenaghan stated while speaking to ESPNcricinfo: “Shikhar Dhawan and Shubman Gill batted beautifully at the top. With the two new white balls, you do need to build a base at the top. They set an exceptional platform.“You wouldn’t have expected Suryakumar Yadav to get out third-ball. He’s been the most in-form batsman around the world. And then Pant (got out) as well. Those guys had the platform to kick on.”

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He expressed: “120/0 was a perfect setup for a score like 320-330. But then it became 160/4. Surya got out. If you want to make 320-330, you want Surya there for some time. Shreyas Iyer and Sanju Samson played a great part. At one stage it looked like they might get 260-270, but Washington Sundar played that cameo and they reached 306. But losing those four wickets from 120 to 160 set them back.”

While refusing to blame the Indian openers for not scoring quickly, Jaffer added that it’s an area the team will need to work on. He shared that the two batters cannot bat at a similar pace as well.

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“When you have a good partnership going, one batsman has to be super aggressive. Both batters can’t play in the same manner. It puts you behind the game. Both Indian batters were looking to get aggressive, but got out pretty close to each other,” he stated.