Despite Chris Gayle's sluggish knock against Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) on Wednesday, Punjab Kings assistant coach Andy Flower has backed the star batsman to come good in games ahead in the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL) 2021.
Gayle scored 15 off 17 balls against SRH but Flower believes the 'Universe Boss' has a different style of batting which didn't quite come off on Wednesday.
"Chris has tons of experience. He has scored a lot of runs in all formats of the game over the years and he does it slightly differently. He has got the power we saw when he hit one of the seamers. He didn't quite stay long enough today as he got out at hands of top-class performer Rashid Khan," Flower said in a virtual press conference.
"Shahrukh Khan again showed composure and played a slightly different inning to power the innings we know he can play. Our whole batting group needs to play with more understanding and skills when we come in two days' time," he added.
A dominating bowling effort from Khaleel Ahmed and Abhishek Sharma had helped SRH restrict Punjab Kings to a paltry 120 in 19.4 overs. In response, SRH (121/1) chased down the target with eight balls to spare thanks to a fine batting performance by Jonny Bairstow that left Punjab Kings gasping for breath.
"The conditions were pretty tough today for batting, we knew it was going to be tough before the game started. So I don't think, we handled it as well as we could have. We lost wickets early and even though we had long batting (Fabien Allen) but we still struggled to get a total that could have test SRH," said Flower
"I think on a pitch like this you got to be quite canny about the way you approach there won't be many boundaries certainly not playing like in Mumbai, so weren't quite good enough to get a 140 or 150 on this pitch which I think could have really tested the opposition," he added.
Punjab Kings will next lock horns with Mumbai Indians on Friday at MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai.
( With inputs from ANI )
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