Ahmedabad, February 23 – After India's 76-run defeat against South Africa in their Super 8s opener, India assistant coach Ryan ten Doeschate expressed his disappointment with the team's performance but stressed that when a team sets out to win a World Cup, don't expect players "to come and deliver the trophy halfway through the competition."
India suffered their first defeat of the T20 World Cup and ended a winning streak of 12 matches when they were defeated by the Proteas by 76 runs in Ahmedabad on Sunday.
"I am very disappointed with the performance. But, when you set out to win a World Cup, don't expect someone to come and deliver the World Cup to you halfway through the competition. So we understand we've made a lot of mistakes tonight. We understand that you're probably allowed one mistake in this phase of the competition," ten Doeschate told reporters in a post-match press conference.
With a significant loss in Ahmedabad, India now face a challenging task to defend the title they famously won in Barbados in 2024. The defending champions will now most likely need victories against Zimbabwe and the West Indies in their remaining Super Eight fixtures to qualify for the semi-finals, while just one win may also be enough to progress should the Proteas remain unbeaten during the phase.
"We've made a big mistake, and now the responsibility falls on this group of players to turn things around and deliver two solid performances against Zimbabwe and the West Indies. Obviously, with the way the group is, you need at least four points to get through now, and it will require two strong performances and a significant turnaround from everyone involved," he added.
Explaining the rationale behind picking Washington Sundar ahead of vice-captain Axar Patel, ten Doeschate stated it came because of the presence of three left-handers in South Africa's top five.
"In our analysis, we thought the biggest threat was going to come from Quinton and Ryan Rickleton and David Miller. And when you can only choose one of the two (between Washington Sundar and Axar Patel), we thought of someone who can bowl in the powerplay.
"Axar obviously occasionally bowls in the powerplay, but we feel that Washi has found a way to be effective in the powerplay, and he obviously didn't bowl in the powerplay tonight, so it looks like we've purely gone on who's going to bowl through the middle, in which case you would choose Axar.
"But the strategy was around that, and I think in a tournament like this, you want all players to understand that the best intentions were to pick the best 11 to win the game, and I hope Axar takes it in the same spirit," he added.
Reflecting on the top-order batters Abhishek Sharma and Tilak Varma's lean patch in the tournament, the assistant coach said, "I certainly won't make excuses for Abhi or Tilak, they don't need excuses made for them, but I think Abhi's preparation coming into the World Cup with the food poisoning that he had at one stage has obviously hampered his progress in terms of where we want him to be at this phase.
"You want him to be up and running and sort of confident in his swing and confident in his game plan, and when you score three ducks, that is going to start weighing on you. I saw some really good signs on Friday night in the nets; I think I mentioned it in the press conference then. But he looks a little bit short, and our job as the coaching staff is to pull that right. We've got four days to do that," he concluded.
