|| India Correspondent ||
Virat Kohli led India started their T20I journey against England with a defeat. Apart from Shreyas Iyer's half-century, no other batsman could really contribute much, including Kohli who went for a duck. However, Iyer's 48-ball 67 helped India post a 124-run total on the board after the top-order collapsed miserably.
Meanwhile, India's total wasn't enough as England chased down the total with eight wickets and 33 balls in hand. Iyer, who usually bats at No 4, came to bat at No 5 as the team management decided to promote the young wicket-keeper batsman Rishabh Pant ahead of him. While he could manage only 21, Iyer scored one of his career-best innings so far.
While addressing the post-match virtual press-conference, Iyer opened up about the change in his batting position, saying that a batsman needs to be flexible as per the situation. "Coming into the Indian team, you have to be flexible with which batting position you will be batting. I haven't made any changes, it is just the mindset, what the team requires and batted according to the situation," Iyer said.
"It was a challenging situation, we had to keep playing natural game and keep ticking scoreboard irrespective of losing early wickets. I have been in this situation before, been there in IPL, it is not the first time. I knew I will get odd boundaries, and momentum changes if get a partnership and then batters dominate bowlers, so from that point of view, their bowlers bowled well. It was their day and kudos to them," he further added.
Shreyas Iyer further mentioned that India will continue to play freely but will focus on executing the plans keeping the T20 World Cup later this year in mind.
"We have come with a plan and we have to execute as much as possible because going into the World Cup we need to see to it that we have ticked all the boxes. This is a five-match series, so it is a perfect time that we try different stuff and see what suits us," he concluded.
