Ahmedabad: India batter Suryakumar Yadav Tuesday laughed off the suggestion that “people had started labelling him as a finisher”, just like the former Australia cricketer Michael Bevan, saying that he has played very less games for ‘Men in Blue’ till now.
The 35-year-old has batted at number 3, 4, 5 and 6 for India across the T20 and ODI format. He came at five in the first ODI against West Indies on Sunday.
The batter was asked that based on his ability to finish games, which he has done a couple of times for India, people have compared him with Australian great Michael Bevan.
“Michael Bevan, huh? Sir, I’ve just played five games. Or maybe seven. Let me remain, Suryakumar Yadav,” said Yadav hilariously during a virtual press conference, on the eve of the second ODI.
“Whatever number I can bat, whatever situation I am in, if I can make the team win from there, that will be my focus. But I want to be fearless as I am, always,” he added.
The Mumbaikar scored an unbeaten 36-ball 34 and stitched an unbeaten 62-run fifth-wicket stand alongside Deepak Hooda to finish the game for India in the first ODI.
While chasing a below-par target, India batters especially Rohit Sharma played with a lot of freedom and Yadav hinted that the team will continue the same approach going forward. He also feels that batting first isn’t really a big challenge for the side.
“Not really, I think, we have kept things really simple, we are going to bat the same way, we did in the last game, it is just that when we bat first, we need to try and bat till the end to have that defendable score, but the way we batted in the second innings in the last game, I think it was perfect,” the batter said.
“I think the tempo was nice, the intensity and the intent was really good, so there is nothing to change, I mean you just need to be safe and just express ourselves” he added.
Yadav also mentioned that Team India ticked all the boxes in the opener of the series and will try and repeat the same.
“We almost ticked all the boxes, we will try and repeat the same and that is always a challenge to repeat what we do in the first game everywhere, so let’s see, really looking forward,” he said.