Rohit Sharma: ‘I by no means thought the pitch was going to play like that’
On a Kensington Oval pitch that provided bounce and carry for seamers, and switch for spinners, 15 wickets fell in lower than 46 overs within the first ODI between West Indies and India. After being despatched in, West Indies had been all out for 114 in 23 overs. India, who promoted their white-ball specialists up the order, misplaced 5 wickets within the chase earlier than Rohit Sharma, batting at No. 7, hit the successful runs.
“To be honest, I never thought the pitch was going to play like that,” Rohit mentioned on the post-match presentation. “It had everything for seamers and spinners, and the run-scoring was quite difficult. But to restrict them to that score was a superb effort from our bowling unit.
“We by no means thought we’d lose 5 wickets nevertheless it was good to provide some recreation time to lots of these ODI guys who’ve simply are available. But firstly, it was vital for us to get into an excellent place. Restricting them to 115 [114] was an ideal effort, and I assumed we had that commanding place that we wanted, which is why we thought okay, we may strive a few of these guys who have not performed lots of cricket shortly and provides them a go.
“I don’t know when they will get time moving forward, so whenever we get an opportunity like that, we will try to accommodate all these guys.”
Rohit additionally praised Mukesh Kumar who, having made his Test debut earlier on the tour, was taking part in his first ODI. The seamer began with a maiden and bowled a decent line and size, though his first wicket within the format got here off a supply that was brief and vast – Alick Athanaze did not clear a leaping Ravindra Jadeja at backward level.
“Mukesh has been brilliant,” Rohit mentioned. “Even in the Test series we saw he can swing the new ball, has got a bit of pace and is quite consistent as well. So we want to see what he has to offer. I haven’t seen much of him in domestic cricket either, so it was good to see him playing with the white ball as well.”
West Indies captain Shai Hope, in the meantime, lamented the shortage of utility by his batters. Despite dropping three wickets inside 9 overs, West Indies had reached 88 for 3 with Hope trying in full management. Jadeja then triggered a collapse by sending again Shimron Hetmyer, and West Indies misplaced their final seven wickets for 26 runs.
“Too many words come to mind but let’s just say we didn’t play the way we needed to,” Hope mentioned. “On a challenging surface like that, as a batting group, we need to find ways to score.
“Anyone who was watching can see what occurred there. Any 9.30am begin within the Caribbean shall be troublesome [for batting] and the Indian bowlers bowled fairly nicely on this floor, however once more we did not rating sufficient runs.”