Kolkata Knight Riders captain Gautam Gambhir felt that his side lost too many early wickets as they bowed out of the Indian Premier League following a thumping six-wicket loss against Mumbai Indians on Friday.
Kolkata were down to 31/5 at one stage as pacer Jasprit Bumrah and leggie Karn Sharma ran through their dangerous top-order. Gambhir stated that his side knew that the Bengaluru wicket would be difficult for the batters,
“We discussed after the last game that we couldn’t get 160-170 here, we needed 140. We lost too many wickets early on. 107 is not a great score unless you can get the opposition all out. We had to be up for it,” Gambhir said.
Despite getting off to a blazing start in the tournament and topping the table, the two-time champions’ form tapered off at a crucial stage, winning just two of their last seven games.
After being bundled out cheaply by Mumbai Indians, Gambhir said that getting early wickets was the only hope of his side making a match out of it. The 35-year-old also rued a couple of “missed opportunities” on the field,
“Had we had wickets, we could have targeted one or two bowlers. But still I am proud because we put everything we could. We had two opportunities, we missed it. We could have had two cracks at the top two,” Gambhir said.