Mumbai: Delhi Capitals’ newly-appointed skipper Rishabh Pant on Saturday gave special mention to his mentor and Chennai Super Kings skipper MS Dhoni after their seven-wicket win in the IPL.
Pant, who led Delhi Capitals for the first time in the IPL 2021, reckoned walking out with Dhoni for the toss was a special moment for him as the Chennai Super Kings skipper has been his ‘go-to man’.
“Actually, it was special for me captaining in IPL and walking out for toss with MS. I have learnt from him and he’s my go-to man,” Pant said at the post-match presentation ceremony. Speaking of the match Pant admitted that he felt under pressure when Suresh Raina and Moeen Ali were hammering Delhi bowlers for boundaries.
“It was good, once you win the match everything is good. In the middle phase, I was under pressure, but good job from Avesh and the bowlers. We were thinking as to what we will do without Nortje and Rabada and I thought we had to do with the options we have. We thought whatever we have we have to work around this and put the best playing XI. We just wanted to finish the match before one over, we didn’t think about the run-rate,” he added.
Pant also lauded the opening duo of Shikhar Dhawan and Prithvi Shaw. “Prithvi and Shikhar did a good job for us in the powerplay. They kept it simple and looked for boundaries,” he said. CSK posted a challenging total of 188/7 after being asked to bat first.
Chasing 189 for victory, Delhi romped to a seven-wicket victory with eight balls to spare after Dhawan (85) and Shaw (72) struck blistering half-centuries. Dhoni was unhappy with his bowlers after their poor outing. After the match he said, his bowlers will have to pull up their socks.
“We could have bowled slightly better, and if batters are hitting you over the fields, that’s fair enough.The execution of the bowlers was poor and there were boundary balls that they bowled, but the bowlers will have learned and they will apply that in the future games,” Dhoni said.
