Kolkata Knight Riders captain Eoin Morgan said his team could feel proud of their stomach for a fight despite being seemingly out of the contest in their IPL 2021 face-off with CSK on Wednesday.
KKR collapsed to 31/5 in their mammoth chase of the 221-run target on a good batting wicket at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai. However, the two-time champions made an admirable recovery with Dinesh Karthik (40), Andre Russell (54) and later even Pat Cummins (66*) threatening to pull the game in their team’s favour.
KKR overcame the initial hiccups so well that they equalled CSK in terms of the square at the 19th-over mark. And even though the team eventually lost by 18 runs, something that did lead Morgan to rue the five early wickets, the skipper was still happy and “proud” of the turnaround that he saw.
“I wasn’t worried about the net run rate (when we lost early wickets)ю When you are five down, you are bothered about the result of the game and try and find a solution to try and put yourself in a winning position. Dinesh Karthik and Andre Russell did that.
Their partnership did turn the momentum and the fortune our way, considering the really bad start we had. The whole of the innings, we were up with where CSK were in the position in the first innings. But, those five mistakes earlier did cost us. We have to be proud of getting so close and putting ourselves in the winning position.”
said Morgan at the post-match press conference.
Eoin Morgan speaks on personal form with the bat
The defeat against CSK was KKR’s third for the IPL 2021 so far from four outings. The Kolkata-based franchise seems to be hurting from one basic issue: lack of collective performances in either department. On the batting front, Morgan himself hasn’t fired in the tournament yet. But the captain isn’t worrying about it too much and is backing the process to eventually bear him the right results.
“Everything’s about process. I am going about things in an extremely positive way. I’ve been here a long time now. I was here on international duty a month pre-IPL. And I’ve (been) practising well and it’s only a matter of time before something comes together.
The only thing matters in T20 cricket that you have 120 balls to make an influence on the game. Today, reflects that. We have a very deep batting line-up, it’s our strength, lots of experience in that middle and lower-middle order and today we saw that,”
Morgan said.
Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) next take on Rajasthan Royals (RR) on Saturday (April 24) in Mumbai.
