Despite convincing win, Surya says 'we could have been smarter with the ball'

Chennai, Feb 26 (PTI) India captain Suryakumar Yadav was not happy with the bowling performance despite a dominant win over Zimbabwe that kept the hosts in the race for a semifinal berth in the T20 World Cup here on Thursday.

After a heavy loss to South Africa in their Super 8 opener, Indian batters lifted their game to post a massive 256/4 at Chepauk.

Zimbabwe could never really challenge in the run chase but still managed to end at 184 for six.

As the sixth bowler, Shivam Dube leaked as many as 46 runs in his two overs.

"We could have been more clinical with the ball. A win is a win. We will tighten our screws when we play the West Indies," said the India skipper referring to a virtual quarterfinal at the Eden Gardens on March 1.

"I don't want to take credit away from Zimbabwe batters, they batted smartly. We could have been little bit smarter with our options," added Surya.

The captain spoke about the preparation leading up to the must win game against Zimbabwe.

"I think we wanted to leave everything behind. We didn’t think too much about what we did in the league stage or in the last game in Ahmedabad. Our video analyst had prepared a slide for all the batters and bowlers, highlighting what we’ve done well over the past year.

"We looked at that, took a lot of positivity from it, and came here with clarity. With contributions from the top order right down to number seven, I think there was hardly anything missing in our performance," he said.

Zimbabwe captain Sikandar Raza said his team needs to fire in all departments to challenge the bigger teams. With the loss, Zimbabwe were eliminated from the semifinals race.

"A lot of youngsters, most of them are playing their first World Cup, first time ever in India for us. Not that I want to use that as an excuse, but certainly the lessons from the last game, from a batting point of view, I thought we took them really well.

"And you can see how quickly these boys are willing to improve and they showed up today. (on their last game vs South Africa). Certainly the result will take care of itself, but what I'm looking for is definitely a better performance, fielding and bowling," said Raza.

Zimbabwe conceded 250-plus runs for the second time in as many games, contributing massively to the team's losses.

"At the World Cup against the best teams, you need all your three departments to be working hard. And unfortunately, if one lacks, then the game runs away from you. So hopefully in the last game, leave everything on the park and we try and sort out all our three departments and hopefully that gives us the best chance to win the game," he said.

Zimbabwe will end their campaign against South Africa in Delhi on March 1. PTI BS TAP