Mumbai, Feb 11 (PTI) West Indies captain Shai Hope said that his side played a “complete game” in the comprehensive win over England in their T20 World Cup match here on Wednesday.
Sherfane Rutherford (76 not out) and Gudakesh Motie (3/32) thwarted England’s charge twice to help West Indies win their key Group C match by 30 runs.
“I’m just happy that the guys got off the line. We’ve been playing some good cricket patches. Nice to see we’ve got more of a complete game today. Two games up, which is where we want to be in the table,” Hope said at the post-match presentation.
On Roston Chase’ all round show in the match, the captain said, “He’s a versatile player. With the bat, he can come in and stabilise the innings, and then with the ball, he can come and give you some crucial overs in the middle.
“It’s great to see him there come in and get some crucial wickets there for us, put the England batters under pressure, and that’s exactly what we required today to get ourselves over the line.” Asked if Chase was used as a floater with the bat, Hope said, “Yeah, in this situation there, we wanted him to just stabilize a little bit. We understand we’ve got a lot of power in the inning and our batting.
“Today was just a slightly different role for him, but it was good to see him come in and stabilize the innings for us. Outstanding. Yeah, for sure. These guys, they’ve been playing really well the last couple of months.
“Rutherford has been exceptional, especially the last few series that he’s played in. Again, it’s good to see one of the batters putting their hands up today and going big for the team.” He also praised his spinners and is hoping they will continue their good performance going forward.
“When you get some time off, you’ve got to make sure you’re trying to find your team. improve and elevate the game. He (Gudakesh Motie 3/33) is one of the class bowlers that we’ve had for some time now. He’s just shown his class once again on the world stage.
“He’s brought something else to his game and it’s benefiting us a lot here in the middle overs. It’s great to see that he’s continuing to progress and continue doing what he’s doing best for us.” Player of the Match Sherfane Rutherford said his finger is fine, and hopefully he will be fit for the next game.
“I think one of the biggest challenges was Adil Rashid. In our meetings, we knew he was going to be the toughest bowler for us. So for me, it was important to try and keep him out of the game, keep rotating the strike, build a partnership, and back ourselves to make up for it at the end.
“For me, once I trust my process and read the situation, I know that once I’m in, I can always score at the end. So it was important to have a clear mind and play more in time.” England captain Harry Brook said the result was a little bit disappointing but gave credit to West Indies for playing outstandingly.
“Everybody knows how much power they’ve got. If you’re slightly off your line or length, then they manage to hit it for six. We probably thought that it (the target) was chaseable for sure.
“Thank god we won against Nepal the other night otherwise we’d be in a tricky situation.” England suffered a mighty scare before beating minnows Nepal by four runs in their campaign opener.
“We just didn’t quite execute as well as we usually can. No explanation (for top order’s poor show). T20 is such a fickle game. It can go one or the other way. We will go back and have a reflection on it and go again in a few days.” PTI PDS PDS AH AH
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