T20 World Cup: How Surya banked on a video clip to fire up his players

It was just the kind of day Indian cricket fans were hoping for in the ICC T20 World Cup on Thursday. All they now need to do is to beat the West Indies in a virtual quarter final shootout at the Eden Gardens on Sunday to keep their date with the semi-final – albeit as the second team from Group I in Super 8.

Speaking after a dominant 72-run win over Zimbabwe to put the campaign back on the rails, Player of the Match Hardik Pandya admitted that they had kept one eye on their phones to catch up with the day game between South Africa and the West Indies in Ahmedabad. The moment Aiden Markram & Co blew away the Caribbeans by nine wickets on a belter, it threw the net run-rate conundrum out of the window – whereby the defending champions just needed to win their remaining two games.

The Men in Blue complied with the first job on the agenda, against an earnest Zimbabwe but lacking in the wherewithal to contain the powerful strokemakers in the Indian team.  Being sent into bat on a strip which looked full of runs just suited the Indian template and it looked rather surprising that their experienced captain Sikander Raza didn’t bring himself in the powerplay to disturb the rhythm of the Indian openers.

The ploy of bringing in an off spinner against Indian top order had been yielding dividends, though India had rejigged their batting order somewhat by bringing back the right handed Sanju Samson as one of the openers and sending Tilak Varma at five. It must have been a huge relief for the struggling Abhishek Sharma to get his first fifty of the tournament – but the bowlers in the upcoming battles are likely to pose more questions than a Richard Ngarva or Blessing Muzarabani.

Reflecting on the game, the ever-smiling Suryakumar Yadav demanded a tighter game from his bowlers as Zimbabwe had plundered 184 runs off them during the chase. ‘’To be honest, we could have been a little bit more clinical with the ball but it’s fine, at the end of the day win is a win. We’ll take it and we’ll move forward. We’ll tighten our screws when you go and play West Indies,’’ said the captain who struck the ball well for his cameo.

The last three days since the humiliation at the hands of the Proteas, a lot had gone on in the Indian dressing room with the video analysts working overtime to collate a product to pep up the squad. While such details are not often forthcoming from India, Surya was candid in his admission with the broadcasters: ‘’We had a slide which our video analyst had made for all the batters and all the bowlers, what we did over the year. We saw that slide, took a lot of positivity from that and then we came here I think contributions from all the batters, from top till number seven, it was heartening to see.’’

This is a common practice that professional athletes and teams often resort to for visualisation tide over any dip – and this was what former England captain Nasser Hussain advised when Abhishek was passing through his sequence of ducks. The ploy certainly worked as India’s top six played their roles to perfection to build up the second highest total in the history of the World T20: 256 for four with 17 sixes.

The win improved India’s NRR to -0.100 though it still keeps him in third position in the table. The Proteas, meanwhile, stay on top albeit with their NRR taking a beating from + 5.350 to + 1.791 while the West Indies are second at + 1.791.

The defeat, unfortunately, ends Zimbabwe’s dream run – having beaten Australia and Sri Lanka previously to make the elite eight. They play their next game against South Africa on Sunday (1 March) which to all intents and purposes, becomes a dead rubber. They can only play for pride now!