The Gujarat Titans and Punjab Kings’ Indian Premier League encounter, which took place in round 18, ended up being another game decided in the penultimate over. GT had been chasing a meager goal of 154 when they dragged the game into the extra over. Shubman Gill, the GT opener, led the team in scoring with a score of 67 off 49 balls. However, he was out in the match’s penultimate over, with Gujarat still needing six runs to win off the final four balls.
Once more, Rahul Tewatia delivered the goods for his team, striking a key boundary on the second-to-last ball when his team needed four points off of two to win. With his team stretching the game out until the very last over, captain Hardik Pandya expressed displeasure and stressed that going future, his team should end games sooner.
Former India opener Virender Sehwag was harshly critical of Shubman Gill following GT‘s tight victory because he slowed down in the middle overs despite being set at the crease. At one point, Shubman Gill needed only 22 balls to reach 35, but it took him another 18 to achieve 50. Sehwag noted that if Shubman Gill hadn’t scored early, things would have become worse for GT because his acceleration came after he had completed his fifty.
“He scored 67 points off of 49 balls, but when did he turn 50?” He needed about 41–42 balls to get to fifty, therefore, in the last 7–8 balls, he had run up 17 extra runs. After he turned fifty, there was an acceleration. Sehwag stated on Cricbuzz that even if that had not occurred, GT would have been chasing perhaps 17 instead of 7 in the final over.
The illustrious Indian batsman added that Shubman Gill should prioritize his team over personal accomplishments or else cricket will give him a hard slap.
“You can’t assume that if I score fifty points, we’ll still win the game. It’s called cricket. Cricket will give you a hard smack if you ever consider your individual performance instead of the team’s performance. You cannot think in such a way. He might have reached his milestone far sooner and saved more deliveries for his team if he had played with the same intent and close to a strike rate of 200 when he was approaching fifty, according to Sehwag.
With the old ball, it moved more slowly. Shubman Gill
The 23-year-old also acknowledged that when it became more challenging to bat with the old ball, he slowed down toward the conclusion.
“With the old ball, it became slower. Therefore, we needed to start the powerplay strong. When Hardik Bhai left, we somewhat lost our impetus. It wasn’t a massive score, but rotating the stroke and avoiding dot balls were crucial, he added.
It would have been a difficult pill to swallow if Tewatia had not won the game for them, according to Captain Pandya.
“To be completely honest, I wouldn’t have liked the game to go this far. There was undoubtedly plenty that we could have learned from this game. If the game had ended in favor of the opposing team, it would have been a difficult pill to swallow. I don’t enjoy letting it go to the last over; therefore, I would prefer to end the game sooner,” Pandya stated during the post-game presentation.
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