A fuming Tom Moody was left 'embarrassed' after Sunrisers Hyderabad's poor batting against Mumbai Indians, which saw them go down by 20 runs in the Indian Premier League match at the Wankhede stadium in Mumbai, on Saturday.
Chasing 158 for victory on a good batting wicket, Hyderabad wasted a good start from their openers and eventually finished with a disappointing 137 for eight.
"We restricted Mumbai to a total we thought was 15-20 runs lighter of where they could have probably got to, around the 170-run mark, but a disastrous batting performance left us well short and embarrassed," Hyderabad coach Moody said after the match.
Hyderabad were comfortably placed at 52 for one in the sixth over, but the dismissal of Shikhar Dhawan, who stroked 42 from 29 balls, proved the turning point.
K L Rahul (25 from 27 balls), Naman Ojha (9) and Ravi Bopara (23 from 27 balls) struggled to get going in the middle and the visitors even went through a phase when not a single boundary was hit for 43 balls, stretching from the sixth over to the 13th over.
Moody slammed the middle order for not playing according to the situation of the game and throwing their wickets away when it mattered.
“In the middle overs, our shot selection was questionable, we accumulated far too many dot balls as a batting unit and we paid the price at the end for it,” he said.
“Leading into this tournament, leading into today’s game, we had the utmost confidence in the middle order stepping up when the opportunity presented and today there was the perfect opportunity for our middle order to build on a very good platform both Shikhar and David (Warner) gave us in the chase. We failed dismally. At the end of the day, that was a very bad loss for us,” the Australian added..
Moody believes that it is responsibility of the batsmen to see the team through till the end once they get their eye in.
“Whether it’s Indian or overseas players, it makes no difference to me. If you are batting in the top order you have got responsibility to see the game through. We didn’t have anyone who was prepared to take that responsibility and see the innings out,” he said.
He is hoping the young batsmen in his side can learn from their mistakes and make most of their opportunities in the matches to come.
“We went in with an extra fast bowler (Trent Boult) today, therefore we had to sacrifice an overseas all-rounder or a batsman. Therefore, it puts that little bit more pressure or the opportunity for an Indian player to step up and make his mark; that was opportunity wasn’t taken today. But, overall, I don’t think we have got a weak batting side; we have got a strong batting side,” he said.
