Jasprit Bumrah: 'It wasn't easy to score heavily'

India lost six for 40 in just over eight overs, eventually managing to run up a total of 126. Australia had its own share of troubles, scraping through to victory off the last ball.

Published : Feb 25, 2019 00:10 IST , VISAKHAPATNAM

Jasprit Bumrah bowled a brilliant penultimate over and almost helped India pull off a victory.
Jasprit Bumrah bowled a brilliant penultimate over and almost helped India pull off a victory.
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Jasprit Bumrah bowled a brilliant penultimate over and almost helped India pull off a victory.

Jasprit Bumrah has defended India's batting performance in the first T20 against Australia, pointing out that a slow, low pitch played a part in the middle-overs collapse.

India lost six for 40 in just over eight overs, eventually managing to run up a total of 126. Australia had its own share of troubles, scraping through to victory off the last ball.

"The wicket was a little difficult to bat on. It was sluggish. It wasn't easy to score heavily," said Bumrah afterwards.

"Once you know your target is small, batting is a little different. Once you hit one boundary you don't need to take a lot of risks. When we were batting first we were still figuring out what is a safe total. Maybe that was the difference."

READ: Australia prevails in last-ball thriller to take 1-0 lead

Bumrah added: "On this wicket, around 140-145 would have been a very good score. There was low bounce and it was difficult to hit big shots. We were short by 15-20 runs but we had a fighting total."

Bumrah, who finished with three for 16, had nearly clinched the game for India with his 19th over. The Gujarat pacer did not have too many complaints about Umesh Yadav's final over, off which Australia managed to score 14 runs.

"It can always go both ways. Once you bowl the last over in a close game, it's 50-50. You try your best, you're always clear in your execution, but some days it works and some days it doesn't. We wanted to close the game in our favour but it's OK, it happens. Death bowling is always difficult," he said.

Maxwell Delighted

Glenn Maxwell, meanwhile, was delighted that Australia had begun the tour with a narrow win. "A lot of times when you go overseas, you get to these close games and you lose them so often," he said.

"The home crowd can get behind the home team and you can lose and it can take your momentum away. The days that you are stuck in your hotel become really long. The way in which we got ourselves into trouble in this game, we probably should have lost.

If it wasn't for Pat Cummins and Jhye Richardson pulling something out of the hat, we would have lost. To have a result like this in our first game on the tour is great for our confidence. Winning momentum is great but losing momentum is pretty hard to turn around."

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