‘Bairstow not a gamble’

After Jonny’s unbeaten 108 guides PBKS to biggest-ever T20 chase against KKR, Impact Player Prabhsimran says there’s no risk in Englishman’s inclusion despite few low scores

Batting records lay strewn across the Eden Gardens turf on Friday night as Punjab Kings pulled off the biggest chase in T20 history and plunged Kolkata Knight Riders to an eight-wicket defeat. It eclipsed South Africa’s chase of 259 against West Indies last year.

Jonny Bairstow, having sat out a couple of matches after scoring just 96 in six, was back. It proved a masterstroke as he scored an unbeaten 108 off 48 deliveries with eight fours and nine sixes to help PBKS snatch a most unlikely victory. “No, his inclusion wasn’t a gamble. He’s such a big player, and one or two bad innings doesn’t change that,” reminded PBKS’s Impact Player Prabhsimran Singh, who put on 93 off 36 with Bairstow for the first wicket. 

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Prabhsimran Singh

Tendo too said it wasn’t a surprise. “We planned for him but didn’t execute them well,” he said.

How can a team lose after putting 261 on the board?

“I wouldn’t say complacency; I think the way batting is going across the competition, if anything, there is an element of fear,” Ryan Ten Doeschate responded to a post-match question on KKR’s disappointing bowling. “There is a lot of upside with the ball if the guys are going to take on that battle,” added the assistant coach, almost as if he was reassuring bowlers across the competition to not lose heart in the face of what he reminded was “a new phenomenon”.

IPL-17, just past its midway stage, has already produced 200-plus totals 24 times in 42 matches, seven of them by teams chasing a target. The 260-mark, breached just once before, was achieved on seven occasions this season. Since its launch in 2008, a match has produced more than 500 runs on only seven times, three of them already this year.  

‘Tendo’, as the 43-year-old former Dutch all-rounder is named, pointed to Sunil Narine’s bowling (4-0-24-1) to make a point. “Sunil was fantastic. By and large they (the bowlers) have been good with problem solving...they must find a way around to stop batters from taking the match away,” he said. Not giving undue importance to the toss, he goaded bowlers “to be brave and go after the batters instead of just waiting” for an answer.

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