Mullanpur, April 1 It wasn't an easy pitch to bat on, said Gujarat Titans assistant coach Parthiv Patel, citing the challenging pitch as the primary reason for his team's three-wicket loss to Punjab Kings in their IPL opener here.
Punjab Kings chased a 163-run target with five balls to spare on Tuesday.
"As a team, we want them to fight. I am happy that we took the game to the last over," Patel said in the post-match press conference.
"It wasn't the easiest pitch to bat on. It has been raining here for the last three-four days, and the groundsmen did a really good job to prepare the pitch. Once the ball got old, it started to reverse a bit, and it also held up a bit. After the powerplay, batting wasn't easy," he explained.
However, Patel also stated that the difficult pitch does not take away credit from the effort of Punjab's bowlers.
Senior spinner Yuzvendra Chahal (2/28) and seamer Vijaykumar Vyashak (3/34) kept things tight to restrict Gujarat to a relatively modest total, before young Australian southpaw Cooper Connolly marked his IPL debut with a decisive 44-ball 72 to steer the home side past the finishing line.
"As I said, the Punjab bowlers, the way they bowled in the final overs, they bowled cleverly towards the end," Patel said.
Elaborating on what went wrong for the Shubman Gill-led side, Patel said conditions played a major role.
"The match went to the 20th over. A wicket here or there, and maybe even 160 runs wouldn't have been chased. Due to the rain, the dry pitch started to play better. The ball was skidding and coming onto the bat nicely.
"The outfield also became a bit wet. If everything had gone our way, maybe we could have won this match," Patel said during the post-match press conference.