ZCZC
BSP-23
CRICKET-MALAN-LAMENT
Malan laments for missing opportunity in must-win game
DHAKA, Jan 8, 2020 (BSS) – Cumilla Warriors captain Dawid Malan lamented for not grabbing opportunity to beat Khulna Tigers when his side was in a position of dominance in most part of the chase.
Khulna Tigers piled up a hefty 179-2 but Cumilla, despite losing the two key wickets of Malan and Stiaan Van Zyl, was very much in the game through Soumya Sarkar and Sabbir Rahman.
They needed one of them to bat deep with the asking run rate in the control but both of them got out in crucial moment to finally as Cumilla sank by 34 runs.
Malan believes the loss of Soumya Sarkar’s wicket was crucial to their defeat, which almost dented their hopes to seal the play-off race. With one game at hands, Cumilla needs to win it and waits for the outcome of other matches.
“We were on par to win the game, we were above the rate with 15 runs ahead of them with 6 overs to go with 5-6 wickets in hand. The way Sabbir and Soumya played was fantastic. They kept us in the game the whole way, they kept up with the rate,” Malan said here today.
“Soumya getting out there was a massive wicket, he is our in-form player, he has been playing exceptionally well. So, it was disappointing that happened but we still should have won that game. We needed 10 runs an over with 5-6 wickets in hand with 6 overs to go. So it was disappointing that we did not come closer.”
Also there was a lack of finishers in the team, which was another reason that Cumilla couldn’t cash in on it, insisted Malan.
“You always want Andre Russell or Kieran Pollard or someone to be there in the end. But they did not have that in their team, they had one of their set batsmen there, top 4 batsmen scored runs.
“We had two of the top 4 batsmen there who were really playing exceptionally well. We just needed one of them to bat for another three overs and it would have been a different game,” he said.
But Malan expressed his pleasure over the form of Sabbir Rahman who was dropped in the previous game for his poor run of form but returned with bang with a 39 ball-62 against Khulna while opening the innings.
“I think it’s always easy to be critical. Yesterday he [Sabbir] was dropped for not scoring runs and today he had an unbelievable innings of 60 off 30 balls [62 off39]. I think as batsman in general, you get in, you want to finish games or win games, that is where you judge yourself on, not just the number of runs you score, you judge yourself on the number of wins or contribution you have to winning games,” he said.
“I think he [Sabbir] probably would be disappointed that he did not bat that little bit longer but he played a hell of a knock. To come from where he was, after being dropped yesterday to batting in a different position than where he has the whole tournament. All credit to him to come back and play as well as he did.”
BSS/SMP/SMM/1850 hrs