Just one bad day for Gujarat Lions: Pravin Tambe

Spinner Pravin Tambe defended his side, Gujarat Lions’, 10-wicket defeat against the Sunrisers Hyderabad at Rajkot. Gujarat Lions went into the match as the favorites, having won 3 out of their previous 3 games. But an ordinary batting effort and a thoroughly dominant display by SRH openers saw the Lions face an embarrassing defeat.

Pravin Tambe termed the team’s defeat as “just one bad day” for the side and hoped for things to come good in the matches that follow. “We have seven specialist batsmen in our side, who can turn the match single-handedly, but it was just one bad day for us that none of them could make runs except skipper Suresh Raina,” Tambe told media persons after the match.

None of the Gujarat Lions batsmen could find their feet at the crease and it was only their skipper Suresh Raina who looked settled against the SRH bowlers. Gujarat Lions posted 135/8 in their 20 overs with Raina top-scoring with 75 off 51 balls.

Tambe was asked whether the batting is over-dependent on Aaron Finch, to which he answered, “We have good match winning players in our side, but none of them could do much with the bat. It was not our day and it happens to every team on a particular day.”

The veteran spinner concluded that the team was perhaps 20 runs short. He is confident that the side will come up with a better show in their next home game.

“The wicket was neither bad nor an easy to bat on. The result of the match would have been different if we could have scored around 160,” he said. “We have to play our next game at home and we want to give our better performance in that game and definitely we will bounce back in the next game,” he added.

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