The morale-boosting win against England may have brought back smiles to the Indian camp but captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni warned his teammates that they have a tough task tomorrow when the side locks horn with South Africa for a semifinal berth of the Twenty20 World Cup.
“We have another do-or-die match and it would be a tough game,” Dhoni said after India beat England by 18 runs to stay afloat in the tournament.
“They would definitely come up with new strategy, specially for the boys who are batting well and the bowlers who are doing well.
“So I think we have to respond in a positive way. We need to trust and back ourselves and go out with positive thoughts,” he added.
Dhoni heaped praise on Yuvraj Singh for his match-winning 16-ball 58 but also mentioned that it was the 136-run opening stand between Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir, which had laid the foundation for a big total.
“We got a good start, and we knew if the openers saw the the first couple of overs, we would get in a good position.
Both Sehwag and Gambhir did well and we capitalised it in the middle over. And it was superb finishing by Yuvraj in the end.”
Dhoni said he was eyeing a total around 180 but Yuvraj’s sterling knock took it past the 200-mark.
“The way we started, I thought we would get 180. You don’t get six sixes in six balls but what Yuvi did was excellent for the team and we were fortunate to get a 200-plus score,” he said.
His opposite number Paul Collingwood was happy that despite India’s imposing total of 218, his boys did not give in without putting up a fight.
“It was unbelievable. India had got a total like that and we still made a great feast of it to go out there and get 200 for ourselves,” he said.
He rued it was Stuart Broad’s expensive over that made all the difference between both the sides.
“Obviously, the big difference between the two sides was an over of 36 runs. It’s pretty hard to drag back. I feel sorry for Broad but it’s a matter of time before we forget that,” he said.