Lucknow Super Giants outplayed Punjab Kings by 56 runs on Friday in Mohali. Post defeat, PBKS batting coach Wasim Jaffer blamed the bowlers and said they could have done better. He also praised LSG batters for their terrific performances.
“You can say our plan backfired but then this is the tendency of all the IPL teams that they bowl first after winning the toss. When the opposition scores 257, chasing will always be difficult. We could have bowled better,” said Jaffer during the post-match conference.
“The way they (LSG batters) started in the powerplay and didn’t stop at all. Ayush Badoni, Marcus Stones, Nicholas Pooran, When somebody plays like this it becomes very difficult. They didn’t lose the momentum after the powerplay. It was an off day for our bowling,” he added.
“We could have used a different plan. Bowled in the larger area, used some slower balls, but we didn’t do that. But we have to credit their batters, they batted brilliantly. It’s one of those days when everything works in the favour of the opponent and you are clueless,” he said.
“Atharva Taide who is just playing his third or fourth match, the way Jitesh Sharma played. If we could have managed to restrict the Lucknow batters to 220-230, the match could be different but this is all thinking in hindsight,” Jaffer stated.
Talking about the match, Punjab won the toss and asked Lucknow to bat first. Kyle Mayers starred again and made (54 runs off 24 balls) and Marcus Stoinis (72 runs off 40 balls) and powered their team to a huge 257 for five. In reply to that, Punjab could only score 201 runs in 19.5 overs, with Atharva Taide playing a useful hand of 66 runs in just 36 balls. Yash Thakur and Naveen-ul-Haq shared 7 wickets between them.