Nagpur: India pulled off the second and third highest-ever successful run chases in ODI in the ongoing series against Australia but captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni gave a twist to the talk of his side's awesome batting display by putting a question mark on the direction the limited-over game is moving. Nonetheless, Dhoni praised his batsmen for the stunning run chase.
"Yes I think Virat was brilliant, the reason being that as the ball got old he was counterattacking and maintaining a good position when going for the big shots. He made it look easy and the way he took pressure off the batsmen was amazing. Its always about taking the pressure off the new batsman," said Dhoni of Kohli (115 not out) who hit the third fastest hundred by an Indian from just 61 balls.
Asked about the seventh ODI in Bangalore which has now turned out to be the summit showdown, Dhoni said, "Bangalore is known for its big runs so not sure how much we will need to chase or how much we have to set to chase over there."
Australian captain George Bailey was disappointed to have lost the match but said he has no complaints.
"It is disappointing (that we lost). Still a beautiful batting wicket so you don't see many batters complaining about it. Virat played an unbelievable knock and when a guy is batting well that is all you can do," he said.
"We needed to find early breakthroughs. You can always do things differently, that never changes, win or lose, but we fought our way back into the game really well. We made them hit really good shots."
Reminded that he has scored the highest runs by an Australian against India when he hit his career-best 156 today, Bailey said, "But we are losing mate. If you are a spectator you will be loving this (high-scoring matches) so we are really looking forward to Bangalore."
Indian cricket team's batting mainstay Virat Kohli said that he finds chasing targets more comfortable as one knows the task at hand, while adding he enjoys batting under lights.
"I like bating under lights as I have said before, and if you have a target on board its always easy to analyse how many runs you need and how to go about it," Kohli said at the post match press conference.
Kohli was awarded the man of the match for his splendid unbeaten 115 off just 66 balls which took the Indian side home in a difficult run chase of 351.
On his sensational batting effort, Kohli said that he backed himself while taking on Australia's strike bowler Mitchell Johnson in the latter part of the innings.
© ndtv
© ndtv
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