J Arun Kumar’s belief in his batting line-up appeared to be waning after their shoddy display at the M Chinnaswamy stadium on Tuesday.
Chasing 245 runs to win against Odisha, Karnataka managed to knock off 43 runs on Sunday that left with a target of 202 runs on the final day.
Facing up to Odisha’s bowlers, who did nothing more than put the ball in the right spot and wait for them to make the mistakes, Karnataka’s batsmen presented a poor account of themselves as they were all bowled out for 179 – 65 runs short of what would have fetched them six points.
“It’s definitely disappointing. We discussed that we will be positive on these tracks; to counterattack you must convert a four-day game into an ODI,” said batting coach Arun.
“The guys turned into defensive mode but playing like how Gautam played would have helped a lot. Once they spread the field, there are more chances to get the singles which is difficult with nine guys around you. They didn’t put in practice what we have talked about.”
The former Karnataka skipper also felt that his batsmen would have been better of playing their natural games.
“I thought the batsmen were more bothered to get amongst runs. Having scored so many runs in the last couple of seasons, somewhere deep down it must have been rankling them that they need to get some decent runs after a few poor runs this season. So they wanted to stay at the wicket for a longer time.
“(As a result) somewhere, the interest of the team was lost. When you look at it, certain guys should play certain roles. Attacking batsmen like Manish Pandey and Robin Uthappa should be playing their roles and some guys like Ganesh should know their roles properly. They knew that but they were not able to execute that.”
While Karnataka wallowed in defeat, Odisha, who showed a lot of aggression on the field, were ready to party.
“We showed a lot of aggression and managed to take charge of the game. People think that Odisha is a small state and we can be dominated but we want to change the perception,” skipper Natraj Behera, who found it hard to contain his excitement, said.
Ranji Trophy Group B standings
Teams Mat Won Lost Draw Pts Quotient
* Odisha 4 2 1 1 13 0.948
* Baroda 4 1 0 3 13 1.090
* Delhi 4 1 1 2 11 1.435
* Uttar Pradesh 3 1 0 2 10 1.277
* Tamil Nadu 4 1 0 3 9 0.790
* Vidarbha 3 1 0 2 8 1.004
* Karnataka 4 0 1 3 5 0.846
* Maharashtra 3 0 1 2 4 0.983
* Haryana 3 0 3 0 0 0.775
