Cricket News

‘Please take into account the pitch and conditions’- Shardul Thakur hits back at the journalist asking about the form of the bowling unit

 

The Indian team is currently in Ranchi playing the second One Day International against South Africa. Before the game started Shardul Thakur was quizzed about whether the bowling attack has misfired or had not been in the same rhythm and flow since the retirement of former captain MS Dhoni since he used to offer a lot of guidance to the bowlers from behind the stumps.

Shardul was quick to point out that Dhoni has been a great player and his absence will forever be missed in Indian Cricket and that he was a class apart. The experience that Dhoni had was tremendous but that does not mean that the bowlers have been inconsistent. Shardul Thakur has played for Pune and Chennai under Dhoni in the Indian T20 League.

“Everyone misses Dhoni because his vast experience matters a lot for everyone. He has played more than 300 ODIs, and more than 90 plus Test matches. It’s very difficult to find someone as experienced as him. Our generation has played with him hence we do miss him.”

When asked about the bowling, Shardul said that many factors need to be taken into account such as conditions and opposition. He also said that the South African bowlers got smashed around in the second innings as well in the first ODI. He added that whenever the side has played white ball cricket they have largely been consistent with the results.

Regardless of how the pitch is, we have always given a good fight: Shardul Thakur

“I feel before you ask about someone’s consistency, you should check what conditions they played in and how the pitch was. Many a times in an ODI game a team scores more than 350 runs and that is a situation where all bowlers are taken for runs. But are the opposition also able to score runs. Whatever matches happen here are never one-sided. Regardless of how the pitch is, we have always given a good fight. We may have lost one or two matches here and there, but we have won maximum matches. So I feel there is a lot of consistency within this team,” the pacer further added.

India will hope to win the second ODI and square the series at 1-1 so that they will have all to play for at the decider which will take place in Delhi.