Suryakumar Yadav Explains Why India 'Purposely Played 6 Batters' In 4th T20I

India played with five specialist bowlers and six batters in the fourth T20I against New Zealand in Visakhapatnam on Wednesday (January 28), but their decision backfired as the Kiwis first managed to post a total of 215/7 in their quota of 20 overs and then bowl India out for just 165 in 18.4 overs to secure a win by 50 runs. India’s decision to replace Ishan Kishan, who had a niggle, with left-arm pacer Arshdeep Singh raised a few eyebrows. But while speaking to former India spinner Murali Kartik during the post-match presentation ceremony, Suryakumar said that India purposely played with six batters.

Explaining the rationale behind not considering a batter as a replacement for Ishan, Surya said that the Indian team management wanted to have

five bowlers and challenge themselves.

“I feel we purposely played six batters today. We wanted to have five perfect bowlers and wanted to challenge ourselves. Like for example, if we’re chasing 200 or 180, and we wanted to see if we were two down or three down, how does it look? But then it’s fine at the end of the day. And we wanted to play all the players who are part of the World Cup squad. Otherwise, we would have played other ones,” he said.

During the conversation Surya was also asked about his decision to field first, especially when India won the series by chasing down big targets in the second and third T20I matches. And in reply to that question, the Indian skipper stated that the team wanted to challenge themselves in the chase of 180-200 runs and see how they perform when 2-3 batters get out early in the innings.

He even went on to add that if he wins the toss in the fifth T20I, he might field first once again.

“We’ve been batting really well when we’ve batted first. So I wanted the guys to take that responsibility if we’re chasing 180 or 200 and two wickets or three wickets are down and see how we bat. So it’s a good challenge. Hopefully if we get an opportunity again, we might chase again,” Surya said.

In the match that India lost by 50 runs, Shivam Dube played a super knock of 65 runs from just 23 balls. Dube needed only 15 balls to complete his fifty, and during his stay at the crease, he slammed 3 fours and 7 sixes.

Surya was full of praise for Dube for his knock and stated that one batter with him would have made a lot of difference.

“The way Dube batted, one batter with him would have made a lot of difference at the end of the game. I think 50 runs; we lost by 50 runs. But it’s okay. As I said, one or two partnerships like this in a run-chase like this might make a difference.