New Zealand players celebrate the fall of an Indian wicket in the second T20I at Rajkot on Saturday. PTIRajkot: India captain Virat Kohli praised New Zealand for their impressive effort but also admitted that his batsmen "were not good enough" on the day as they lost the second T20 International by 40 runs.
The third and final match of the series will be played in Thiruvananthapuram on Tuesday. The match to be played at the Greenfield International Stadium will also be the first T20I to be played in Kerala.
"Eventually, we were not good enough with the bat. When you are chasing 200, all the batsmen need to chip in, or one batsman has to keeping going at a 200 strike-rate. Tried to do my best. MS was very good at the end. But we were left with a very difficult task. It happens to a lot of batsmen, sometimes you are in good form, but you don't get enough balls," Kohli said at the post-match presentation ceremony.
"I thought New Zealand were really good with the bat early on. We didn't take our chances, yes, but at once stage they were looking to get 235-240 and credit to Bumrah and Bhuvi to pull things back," Kohli said.
Hardik Pandya has gone off the boil since the back end of the back-end of the Australian series but the skipper defended the talented all-rounder.
"We back our batsmen though. We back Hardik, and its just a little glitch. After 13-14 overs, it gripped a bit. But we have no excuses, we weren't good enough with the bat. There wasn't any kind of dew. The ball got scuffed up (to help it turn)."
Man of the match Colin Munro said: "A few chances (dropped catches) went my way and that's T20 cricket. I was here in the 'A' trip. Felt good with the bat, but kept getting out. I love batting at the top of the order."
"I was talking with McMillan (batting coach), and the times when I have premeditated is when I've been trying to do too much. So I have just got to stay still and react to the ball."
Black Caps skipper Kane Williamson was satisfied that they could turn the tables within one match.
"I guess it was a contrasting performance from the last game. An improved performance on all sides, we need to keep doing this to beat India here and going on to the next game, we need to repeat this," Williamson said.
He lavished praise on Munro for his brilliant century.
"Great partnership up at the top and obviously Munners getting a hundred was fantastic. When a batsman gets that many runs, the team will always get a big total.
"(Martin) Guptill and (Tom) Bruce gave good support and the bowlers did really well to defend it. Whenever you watch a player similar to you perform, you want to emulate them and our two spinners did really well, they consistently came in to bowl tough overs and they bowled very well."
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