'Was a No-brainer to Bowl Spin Early': KL Rahul on Lucknow's Pitch After Win Over SRH

Lucknow Super Giants captain KL Rahul said that using spinners early in the game against Sunrisers Hyderabad was a no-brainer for him. Lucknow registered their second win of the season and moved to the top of the points table. It was a dominant performance from Lucknow in all three departments as Sunrisers Hyderabad just failed to put up a fight as their team selections suggested that they didn’t read the pitch right.

However, that was not the case with Rahul as he revealed that he read the pitch on the eve of the match.

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“Yesterday (when did he know how the pitch would play?). We’ve been here for a couple of weeks now. Knew what we were getting into (nature of the pitch)," Rahul said in the post-match presentation.

The LSG skipper suggested that using the spinners in powerplay was always in his plans as Jaydev Unadkat’s cutters were also gripping.

“We saw in the first couple of overs: when Jaydev bowled a few cutters, they were gripping. Was a no-brainer to bowl spin early. I knew KP is better in the powerplay," he added.

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Rahul further lauded the batting unit to adapt well according to the situation and said that the players had conversations to help each other out.

“First instinct when I saw both pitches was that we’ll need to bat smartly here. We’ve adapted well as a batting unit. Each person plays very differently. Just have been a couple of chats with the batting group to help each other out. Good to see the players are going there and putting in the practice," he said.

Lucknow Super Giants defeated Sunrisers Hyderabad by five wickets in a low-scoring match. Spin all-rounder Krunal Pandya (3/18) starred with the bat and the ball. He blew away the Sunrisers’ top-order to restrict them to a paltry 121/8 before scoring a vital 34 off 23 balls to give LSG their second win of the season.

Opting bat, things didn’t pan out Sunrisers’ way as Krunal took the scalps of openers Anmolpreet Singh and Mayank Agarwal and skipper Aiden Markram. Veteran spinner Amit Mishra (2/23) took two wickets.