“Could not handle the pressure”: KL Rahul’s frank opinion on LSG’s defeat against KKR, puts the blame squarely on… | cricket news

Lucknow Super Giants captain KL Rahul did not shy away from talking about his shortcomings after suffering their biggest defeat in terms of runs in the Indian Premier League against Kolkata Knight Riders on Sunday. LSG were outclassed by the Knights in all aspects of the game resulting in a 98-run defeat and possibly jeopardizing their hopes of making the playoffs. Rahul’s decision to bowl after winning the toss immediately backfired as Sunil Narine went all out against the LSG bowling unit.

The inexperienced side succumbed to the pressure, scoring runs at an astonishing pace and allowing KKR to set the stage for a mammoth total of 235/6. Mohsin Khan, Yash Thakur and Yudhveer Singh together scored 98 runs in just eight overs.

“There were a lot of runs to be scored in the second innings. When you are chasing a big target, you are putting in too much effort and in the end you lose wickets. Overall it is a poor performance. We played our Didn’t score the target (consistent length), overall poor performance with bat, ball and fielding, in the powerplay we saw how they bat and they put a lot of pressure on our youngsters, the bowlers couldn’t handle that kind of pressure and they had some Hit good shots,” Rahul said after the game.

While LSG looked clueless against the hard-hitting Narine, Rahul said they had a plan to deal with the KKR batsmen but the execution went wrong.

“We prepare well in advance and talk about the opposition batsmen, we know our conditions here and we spend a bit of time talking to the bowlers and batsmen and try to see what kind of conditions we have. Need to come up with plans. Once we get here, it’s about execution and we got that part wrong, but the younger group really… the sooner you learn, the better for the team. would be better.”

Talking about the game, LSG won the toss and decided to bowl first. Narayan’s 81 runs, Phil Salt (32 runs in 14 balls, with the help of five fours and a six), Angkrish Raghuvanshi (32 runs in 26 balls, with the help of three fours and a six) and Ramandeep Singh (25 runs in six balls) *) with solid innings. One four and three sixes) took KKR to 235/6 in 20 overs.

Naveen-ul-Haq (3/49) was the bowler of choice for LSG. Yash Thakur, Ravi Bishnoi and Yudhveer Singh got one wicket each.

Chasing the target of 236 runs, Lucknow lost wickets at regular intervals. Marcus Stoinis (36 from 21 balls, with four fours and two sixes) and captain KL Rahul (25 from 21 balls, with three fours) were the top scorers as LSG was bundled out for 137 in 16.1 overs.

Harshit Rana (3/24) and Varun Chakravarthy (3/30) were the top wicket-takers for KKR.

Sunil Narine was adjudged ‘Player of the Match’ for his innings of one wicket and 81 runs.

After the loss, LSG dropped out of the top-4 spot with a negative net run rate of 0.371. While KKR overtook Rajasthan Royals and secured the top position with 16 points.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)