Former Indian captain Sunil Gavaskar said that India’s self confidence was affected after the shambolic defeat against Pakistan in their opening fixture of the ICC T20 World Cup.
After a 10-wicket defeat against arch rivals Pakistan, the Men in Blue were expected to come back with a strong response against New Zealand. However, after being put to bat first India somehow managed to put up a total of 110 which was chased with ease by the Kiwis with more than 5 overs to spare.
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In a conversation with India Today, former Indian skipper and a legend of the game – Sunil Gavaskar stated that team India’s self confidence dented after losing their opening fixture against Pakistan. He added that NZ did not give India any room of freedom as they kept the game under their control.
Sunil Gavaskar elaborated, “You have got to congratulate New Zealand for the way they played. They didn’t allow India the freedom to play their natural game. Yes, you might argue that Rohit Sharma should have opened the batting but look at the way New Zealand bowled. Having lost to Pakistan had certainly demoralized the Indian team. For the last 12 World Cup events, India hadn’t lost but suddenly they lost and they lost very badly.”
He further added: “And I think certainly dented their self-confidence. What they needed against New Zealand was to get off to a great start. But in the first 6 overs, they lost 2 wickets. I have been stressing that teams winning the powerplays go on to win the match. And that’s exactly what happened. New Zealand won both their bowling and batting powerplay.”
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Team India have been criticized heavily after losing two consecutive matches. Skipper Virat Kohli has been heavily criticized for making changes in the batting order which did not work out. Virat Kohli has always stated that outside criticism doesn’t bother him much but Sunil Gavaskar believes that sometimes it can work for the team in a positive way and help them constructively.
Gavaskar said, “This outside world is not sound-proof. Somebody or the other is going to be saying something or the other, which you are going to hear. So, to say that you are checking out the outside noise is easy because what to tell is we don’t care about the outside world, which is fair enough. It’s understandable because the team doesn’t want to be influenced by what has happened.”
He further added, “But sometimes an outside perspective does help. An outside perspective which you can consider. Maybe, there is some sense in what the outside perspective is, and maybe at that particular point of time, you get into a cocoon.”
Qualifying for the next stage seems quite impossible for team India as their fate now does not lie in their hands. Even if India wins their remaining three matches, their qualification for the semi finals is not guaranteed. India will take on Afghanistan on November 3 at Abu Dhabi.
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