Indian all-rounder Shardul Thakur, who dazzled one and all with his all-round performance during the England series, has impressed Chennai Super Kings’ (CSK) bowling consultant Eric Simons as well. Simons praised Thakur by calling him a special cricketer with incredible talent. CSK defeated Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) by six wickets to reclaim the top-slot in the points-table and Thakur played an important role with his 2 for 29. Post the comprehensive win, the bowling consultant said,
“Shardul Thakur is somebody that you can throw the ball to under any circumstances. He wants to bowl and bat under any circumstances. He has incredible self-belief and that is what makes him such a special cricketer. As a team, we very strongly look at the execution of our tactics rather than the outcome. Sometimes, the bowler gets hit for fours and sixes even though the execution is good.”
Thakur shifted the momentum
The 59-year old credited Thakur for shifting the momentum of the match in CKS’s favour after the 111-run opening partnership between RCB skipper Virat Kohli (53) and Devdutt Padikkal (70). Thakur sent back Padikkal and AB de Villiers (12) back to the pavilion. The Kohli-led squad could only manage 25 runs in the last four overs of their innings preventing them to post a big total.
“We didn’t get it quite right in the first half. But in the second half, Shardul in many ways shifted the momentum. He bowled in the right areas and he was clever about the way he went about his bowling. A lot of people speak about our bowling attack being a smart one and I think he epitomized that today. He used his ability to read the wicket and the batsmen in the situation.”
On the team’s turnaround
The South African talked about the team’s turnaround and believes that the side’s performance in the last season was a lesson for them.
“We spoke about what went wrong for us in India is the first half of the IPL and we spoke about what we did wrong here. Any situation, be it good performance or a bad performance, is a learning. What went wrong in the last IPL was a tremendous lesson for us. But, you have to learn the lessons and I think we did," he said.
