IPL 2023: ‘I would take responsibility of playing a lot of dot balls, should have rotated more’ says Venkatesh Iyer

Kolkata Knight Riders star batter Venkatesh Iyer said he would take the responsibility for his side’s slowing down in the middle overs against the Rajasthan Royals after their nine wicket defeat at the Eden gardens on Thursday.
Speaking after the game Iyer said, “I would take responsibility of playing a lot of dot balls there. I should have rotated more and I think that little phase was owned Rajasthan but I think we made a good comeback in the game but at the end of the day it did not matter.”
The left-hander scored 57 runs of 42 balls helping the Knight Riders reach a score of 149-8.
Rajasthan’s fielding has been electric on the night Shimron Hetmyer and Sandeep Sharma took brilliant catches at the start of the innings to pick openers Jason Roy and Rahmanulla Gurbaz speaking of the fielding Iyer said, “Both of them were good shots and great catches. The way they fielded they easily saved around 20-odd runs on the field which in a T20 is unbelievable.”
“Two wickets and two new batters on the crease that wicket was not very easy to bat. So that’s when we slowed down just a little bit,” he added.
Defending a small total on the board skipper Nitish Rana took the new ball and was smashed for 26-runs Yashavi Jaiswal when asked about it Iyer said, :We all know what Nitish is capable of with the ball in hand. He has picked up crucial wickets in his career with the left-hander on the crease off-spinner I don’t think it is a wrong option.”
“Unfortunately, It did not go in our favour. Had he picked up the wicket it would have been the master-stroke anyway. These things happen on the field, he added.”
He also felt the wicket was on the slower side. “The wicket was holing just a little bit on the slower side we wanted to exploit the spin with the newer ball. If the new ball starts turning then it will be very difficult for the batter. It didn’t and we are talking post-game it did not work out.”
Defending his captains decision to open the bowling the gutsy left-hander told, “Had it worked it would have been a masterstroke it didn’t work out that’s why the questions. Nitish is an unbelievable bowler. He has given us breakthrough’s in all the games. Wherever he has bowled he came up and picked wickets with economical bowling.”
Jaiswal slammed the fastest 50 of the IPL in just 13 balls and took the game away from hosts. He ended up with 98 of 47 balls. Talking about his innings Iyer said “I don’t think the wicket changed much. Jaiswal batted unbelievably well. The way he played every ball we did not have answer to his onslaught. When he was batting it felt like he was batting on a different track altogether because no other batter found it easy. It is the variety of shots that he hit.”
“Effective but still orthodox. I remember just one reverse sweep he hit rest all orthodox shots thos shots were needed on this pitch. He is the man in form. But if you get 20-odd runs that really boosts your confidence. The bowling team is waiting for you to make a make and that’s when as a batsman you can capitalize,” he added
Speaking of selection of shots Iyer said, “The game is always changing what a basic shot to Rinku Singh need not be to me. He can pick it up from middle and leg I am not sure if I can do that. So If I am not play that and getting bowled I need to understand what other shots I need to play to score my runs.”

“See in this set-up you are always practicing all those shots. Sweep and reverse-sweep have become an orthodox shots now. If you have command over them then ypu are confident heading into the game and make it look like it is a basic shot. and not an unorthodox shot,” he told the reporters.