England Kept Us Guessing All Through The Game, Says Rohit Sharma

Indian vice-captain Rohit Sharma credited the English team for “using the conditions well” and for playing “complete cricket.”

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England survived to live for another day as they outbatted India for a 31-run win in a high-scoring World Cup encounter, keeping their semi-final hopes alive in Birmingham on Sunday, 30 June.

Indian vice-captain Rohit Sharma credited the English team for "using the conditions well" and for playing "complete cricket."

Rohit told the reporters at a post match presser, "Towards the end it got pretty slow. And yes, you've got to give credit to the English team because they used the conditions really well, used the long boundary really well, mixed up their variation quite nicely, and kept us guessing all through the game. So you've got to give credit to them."

Rohit also emphasised that losing an early wicket into the game puts a lot of pressure on the team.

“It is important that a guy who is informed needs to bat as long as possible. A lot of batting has been done by the top 3-4 guys, so we wanted to make sure these guys are informed try to as long as possible.” 

Indian vice-captain Rohit Sharma

Yuzvendra Chahal and Kuldeep Yadav were hit for 12 fours and as many as nine sixes as they hardly got any purchase from the Edgbaston track.

"It was just an off-day for these two guys (spinners Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal). But we've seen them bowl in tandem really well and put pressure on the batting unit, the opposition rather, so just one off-day, like I said, the England team played complete cricket, they bowled really well, batted really well. They got the result," Rohit said.

Opener Jonny Bairstow's hundred (111 off 109 balls) set the platform and a cavalier 54-ball 79 by all-rounder Ben Stokes took England to an imposing 337 for 7 in 50 overs after batting first, neutralising the spin duo of Chahal and Kuldeep with some heavy duty hitting.

The total proved to be good enough as Rohit Sharma’s (102) 25th ODI hundred and skipper Virat Kohli’s (66) fifth consecutive half-century could only take India to 306 for 5 as England captain Eoin Morgan rotated his bowlers effectively at the death.

Hardik Pandya (45 off 33 balls), found difficult to negotiate.

And when Hardik found it difficult, Mahendra Singh Dhoni (42 not out off 31 balls) with his waning power-hitting abilities could not have done better against Archer even though he gave a better account of himself compared to the previous games.

“When Mahi (Dhoni) and Kedar (Jadhav) were batting, they were trying to hit but they were not able to because of the slowness of the pitch,” Rohit said.

“When you’re chasing around 340 (runs) you need that X-factor innings of someone coming in and playing 70 off 30 or 40 balls. You know Hardik (Pandya) was looking good (45 off 33 balls) but he just couldn’t go on.”

“That is something, from their (England's) side, Ben Stokes did for them. He came and batted (79 runs) and changed the game actually. Until then you know we were right in the game, restricted them pretty well. We needed somebody... like Ben Stokes' innings towards the end to get to that target," he added.

Incidentally, Sunday's pitch was not the one which was used during Pakistan's game against New Zealand where Kane Williamson's part-time off-breaks turned right angles.

(With inputs from PTI)