Sikandar Raza conceded that Zimbabwe’s inability to stick to their defensive plans with the ball proved costly in their 72-run defeat to India in the Super Eights clash at the MA Chidambaram Stadium on Thursday. A lack of discipline allowed India’s batters to dominate, powering their way to 256/4.
“Certainly, I think we could have executed our defensive play slightly better as well. I think we ended up going at them with hammer and tongs, and unfortunately, there was a lot of mixed execution when we were bowling from all the bowlers, and they ended up getting a lot of those runs.
“Once the train gets going at that, it’s hard to bring it back. So I thought, if one thing I would say is, I think we could have executed our defensive plans better. That would have given us a better chance to restrict them to maybe 210, 220, and you never know from there,” said Raza in the post-match presentation ceremony.
India capitalised fully on that inconsistency. Abhishek Sharma struck 55 off 30 balls, Hardik Pandya smashed an unbeaten 50 off 23 deliveries, and Tilak Varma hammered 44 off just 16 balls as India recorded the second-highest total in T20 World Cup history, highlighted by a record 17 sixes.
Zimbabwe’s chase, built around Brian Bennett’s fighting unbeaten 97, eventually closed at 184/6, a respectable effort given the circumstances, but never one that seriously threatened India’s imposing total.
Despite the result, Raza found positives in his side’s batting response. “I’m a guy who looked at a lot of positives. I think for me, the positive from today is that the last game, it was 250, and I felt there was a bit of panic and rush in our batting lineup.
“I always say that you cannot win the game in the first six overs, but you certainly can lose it if you’re chasing a big total. Today, I thought we were a lot more composed in the first six overs. We were trying to give ourselves a chance as well. I thought the way the boys batted compared to the last game is certainly to take a lot of positives and heart from it, and that’s what I’ll do,” added Raza.
With Zimbabwe now out of semifinal contention, Raza offered a frank assessment of where improvements are required. “Yes, batting was there, but I think bowling and fielding, no, I think we could have done better there as well. I think, as I said, the last game sort of taught us how to go on about your business when you’re chasing a big total. So certainly I saw that today. Listen, we are also a work in progress.
“A lot of youngsters, most of them are playing their first World Cup, first time in India for us. Not that I want to use that as an excuse, but certainly the lessons from the last game, from a batting point of view, I thought we took them really well. You can see how quickly these boys are willing to improve, and they showed up today.”
Eliminated from the tournament, Zimbabwe will now face South Africa in their final Super Eight fixture at the Arun Jaitley Stadium on Sunday, playing for pride alone. Raza views the contest as a chance to align all three departments, batting, bowling and fielding, as they had done during the qualifying stages.
“Certainly, the result will take care of itself, but what I’m looking for is definitely a better performance, fielding, and bowling. Hopefully, we can carry on with our batting performance, and it should just keep getting better. So if we can match those three as we did in the qualifying stages, we give ourselves the best chance to win.
“At the World Cup against the best teams, you need all three departments to be working hard. Unfortunately, if one lacks, then the game runs away from you. So hopefully in the last game, leave everything on the park, and we try and sort out all our three departments, and hopefully that gives us the best chance to win the game,” said Raza.