West Indies captain Shai Hope admitted that 352 was a gettable score on the wicket at the Brian Lara Stadium, Tarouba, Trinidad after their huge loss of 200 runs against India on Tuesday. India posted a gargantuan total on the board after Ishan Kishan, Shubman Gill, Sanju Samson, and Hardik Pandya scored fine fifties.
Gill and Kishan laid down the foundation of a big score as the Indian openers added 143 runs for the opening stand, which is the highest for India in the West Indies. Subsequently, Sanju Samson was able to hit the ground running as he completed his fifty off just 39 balls but was dismissed right after getting to the personal milestone.
Hardik Pandya scored an unbeaten knock of 70 runs off just 52 balls to add the finishing touches while SKY scored 35 runs from 30 balls.
On the other hand, the Windies’ top order was rattled by rookie pacer Mukesh Kumar, who scalped three wickets in the Powerplay overs and got rid of Brandon King, Shai Hope, and Kyle Mayers. Furthermore, Shardul Thakur returned with impressive figures of 4-37 in his fine spell.
Meanwhile, Shai Hope feels they didn’t give India a challenge with the ball at the beginning of the innings as Gill and Kishan gave a perfect start to the visitors.
Shai Hope said in the post-match presentation, “Hindsight is the best sight as I keep saying. We saw how the wicket was in the back end and I thought we restricted them well enough. We can look back and change many things but it is what it is. We didn’t give them a challenge with the ball at the start. 350 was a gettable total on that wicket but today wasn’t our day.”
Hope admitted they haven’t been consistent enough in their performances and it has led to their downfall.
He added, “Anytime you play, you gotta believe you can win. I keep stressing on that same thing – the consistency in attitude and the key is to get the guys together and turn some of these losses into wins. Some days we wake up and play like the best team in the world and some days we just get steamrolled.”
West Indies will now look to bounce back in the five-match T20I series against the tourists. The first T20I will be played on Thursday.
