Punjab Kings (PBKS) head coach Anil Kumble has said that the franchise is repeatedly losing games from winning positions. KL Rahul-led side lost yet another winning game to the Rajasthan Royals (RR) by 2 runs in the Indian Premier League (IPL) on Tuesday as well.
With only 7 runs needed off the final 12 balls, and with 8 wickets in hand, PBKS failed to rotate the strike and in the death bowling overs by Mustafizur Rahman and Kartik Tyagi. While talking about that, Anil Kumble admitted that dot balls cost them the game.
“As batters, they certainly know what their scoring shots are, it’s not about just the scoop. It also boils down to that particular batter. When you have 8 runs off 12 balls, I don’t think we needed a scoop, all it needed was a bit of hitting, and even if someone got out, the next batter would at least get 5 or 6 balls to get those runs.
When it goes to the last couple of balls, it becomes really hard…the messaging was very clear that we had to finish in 19 overs, but unfortunately that didn’t happen today,” He said during the post-match press conference.
— Punjab Kings (@PunjabKingsIPL) September 21, 2021
While chasing 186 for victory, Nicholas Pooran (32 off 22) and debutant Aiden Markram (26* off 20) looked comfortable in the middle and took PBKS over the line. But after left-arm pacer Mustafizur conceded just 4 runs in the penultimate over, young Kartik Tyagi did exceptionally well with his outside-off-stump yorkers to give away just a solitary run and claim two wickets as well.
“We need to discuss and sort out” – Anil Kumble
With this, Punjab slipped to seventh in the points table, with just 3 wins from 9 games so far as well. Anil Kumble also stated that they will conduct a post-mortem on their constant failures to close games. However, they will next take on SunRisers Hyderabad (SRH) in Sharjah on Saturday.
“Yes it’s become a pattern, that’s something we need to discuss and sort out. We have five more games, but again, we don’t want to get bogged down by this defeat. It’s certainly a difficult pill to swallow,” Anil Kumble concluded.
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