05 April,2024 05:45 PM IST | Mumbai | mid-day online correspondent
Gujarat Titans (Pic: File Pic)
Gujarat Titans captain Shubman Gill feels that dropped catches made it difficult for the side to register the win against Punjab Kings in the IPL 2024 match at the Narendra Modi Stadium.
In the eleventh over, Azmatullah Omarzai dropped Sikandar Raza's catch. In the 17th over, veteran pacer Umesh Yadav dropped PBKS impact substitute Ashutosh Sharma's catch.
When Ashutosh's catch was dropped, he was just on the score of three runs. Later on, the impact player scored 28 runs in the 14 deliveries at a strike rate of 200.
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"I think a couple of catches went down, never easy (to win) when you drop catches. Bowlers did a decent job, when the ball is coming onto the bat, it's difficult to defend, I wouldn't say we were short (on runs). The new ball was doing something. 200 was good enough. We were right in the game till about the 15th over. Always under pressure with dropped catches," Gill said after the match.
Gill surprised everyone when he decided to hand the ball to uncapped pacer Darshan Nalkande and defend seven runs.
The 24-year-old GT skipper backed the decision to give Darshan the final over and said, "With the way he's (Nalkande) bowled in the last match and with 7 runs to go, it was a no brainer for us. People who you haven't seen will come and play knocks like these and that's the beauty of IPL."
Coming to the match, Gill smashed the highest individual score of the IPL 2024 which is 89'. Rahul Tewatia's knock of 23 runs off eight balls helped the side reach 199 runs for the loss of four wickets.
In reply, Shashank Singh's (61') blitz and Ashutosh's (31) rattled GT as they chased down the target and clinched a three-wicket victory for the Punjab Kings.
(With ANI Inputs)