‘Decision taken before…’: Shubman Gill reveals GT masterplan to outsmart Rohit Sharma, Suryakumar Yadav, Hardik Pandya

Gujarat Titans’ captain Shubman Gill shared on Saturday that the choice to play the IPL match against the Mumbai Indians on a black soil pitch was made even before the tournament kicked off, with the aim of keeping the formidable MI lineup under control.

And it turned out to be a brilliant strategy, as the Mumbai batters found it tough to chase down the target of 197, finishing at 160 for six and facing a 36-run loss.

“The decision was taken before the first match that the second match (vs MI) will be played on black soil. Yes, that was a factor as well, (MI’s strong batting line-up), but this wicket suited us,” said Gill in the post-match presentation.

Gill mentioned that these kinds of tracks would really challenge players when it comes to hitting boundaries, a lesson learned by MI’s big hitters like Hardik Pandya, Suryakumar Yadav, and Tilak Varma.

“Batting on black soil, once the ball gets old, it’s difficult to clear the boundary, so we tried to maximise the power play. We can all talk about plans, but sometimes it goes your way and sometimes it doesn’t,” he added.

Mumbai Indians skipper, Hardik Pandya, attributed their significant loss to the Gujarat Titans to fundamental mistakes in both batting and bowling. It is difficult to pinpoint exactly where things went wrong. Pandya stated, “Tough to put (down where it went wrong). There were basic errors in both bat and ball, we were not quite professional in the field – that cost us maybe 20-25 runs.”

“They (the GT openers) did the right stuff in the power play, they did not play high-risk shots, they got enough runs (playing that way) and that put us on the back foot.”

The match definitely had its moments of drama, especially when Pandya found himself in a fiery exchange with GT spinner R Sai Kishore during the 15th over of MI’s chase. But in a nice twist, the two shared a heartfelt hug after the game.

“He’s a good friend of mine, inside the field it should be like that, but we don’t take things personally,” Kishore said.

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