Shubman Gill is new to being captain of the Gujarat Titans and it’s been challenging for him. But David Miller, an experienced player on the team, supports him. Miller believes Gill, who is 24 years old, is starting to get the hang of being captain. However, under Gill’s leadership, the Titans are not doing well in the league. They were champions in 2022 and runners-up last year, but this year, they’re in ninth place and unlikely to make it to the playoffs.
“Shubman is an exceptional player, as we all know. He is still young and has a lot to learn. But I feel he is adjusting really well to the captaincy. But I feel it’s a tough one too because the margins are so small,” said Miller in his post-match press meet after GT went down to Royal Challengers Bengaluru by four wickets here on Saturday.
Miller pointed out that the Gujarat Titans are struggling in the Power Play overs because they are missing veteran fast bowler Mohammed Shami, who is recovering from an ankle surgery.
“Shami, obviously, was really exceptional in the power play. So, we feel like we kind of miss him in the power play, as he picked up wickets and kept the economy rate down,” said Miller.
During the match against RCB, the Titans gave away 92 runs in the Power Play while defending a modest score of 148, which significantly favoured the home team and ultimately decided the outcome of the match. The Gujarat team didn’t perform well in the Power Play when batting, scoring only 23 runs, which was the lowest by any team this season during that phase of the game.
Gujarat Titans’ Struggles in IPL Power Play Overs
Gujarat Titans‘s run rate of 7.54 and strike rate of 118.43 in the Power Play are the lowest among all the teams in this IPL. They’ve also scored the fewest runs in the first six overs, totalling 469. The South African left-handed batsman acknowledged that the Titans have struggled at the beginning of matches, both with their batting and bowling performances.
“Their (RCB bowlers) lengths were a lot better than ours. But we just missed our length, and in the first two, two and a half, three overs where they were already on like 50-60 runs. It just looked like they (GT bowlers) were a little bit too far full. I think we were a little bit behind the 8-ball in the power play with our batting and bowling,” he added.
Describing the Titans’ performance this season, Miller mentioned that they have struggled to win close matches, a situation contrasting with their success in tight games over the past few years.”There are certain games that we potentially should have won, that we did lose and were pretty close.
If we had won those two games, things would have been very different. We won crucial moments (last year) and this year we just haven’t been able to win those crucial moments, hence losing the close games,” he added.
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