Plan is to bat just once, says Shreyas

 After helping Karnataka restrict their rivals Odisha to 232, all-rounder Shreyas Gopal said that his team’s batsmen must now stick to basics and aim for a big total.

“We will look to stick to our basics and bat well on the second day. The plan is to bat only once in the game and we are looking at a good first innings lead,” Shreyas told reporters here.

Shreyas revealed that the management opted for three spinners after having a good look at the track. “We realised that we can’t expect too much from the fast bowlers on this surface and hence we went three spinners.”

Shreyas, who played a key role with the ball in Karnataka’s title winning effort last season, didn’t have a great start in this season. With just five wickets from the first three matches, the youngster wasn’t at his best. But Shreyas seems to be hitting form at the right moment, grabbing six wickets in the next two matches and a 4/75 in this match. “It is good to be back among the wickets. I didn’t bowl too many short balls and the pitch offered some amount of turn. I also received good support from the other spinners, which was of good help,” said Shreyas, who now has taken 15 wickets in this season so far.

Lacking patience

Odisha’s Govinda Poddar, who cracked a fine century to prevent his side from a massive collapse, felt that his team’s batsmen could have shown more patience. “Our batsmen lacked patience. We could have posted 100-120 runs more than our current total on this surface.”

Feeling happy about his good run, Poddar stressed that more than the individual achievements, he is more concerned about his team’s results. “I am happy about my form. But my team needs to win this match and I hope our batsmen won’t repeat the mistakes in the second innings.”