India must work together, not blame pitches, says Ishan Kishan

Ishan Kishan has played down his T20I ranking ahead of India’s series decider against the West Indies, saying he wants to enjoy pressure situations. He urged the team to focus on preparation, intent and execution rather than individual performances or results

Bengaluru: India wicketkeeper-batter Ishan Kishan on Saturday played down talk of his status as the world’s top-ranked T20I batter, saying he wanted to put statistics aside and enjoy the pressure of playing the series decider against the West Indies at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium.

With the five-match series level at 2-2, the left-hander said he was not concerned about his position in the rankings at this stage of his career. Persistent rain delayed the start of pre-match warm-ups, with the game also marking the first international fixture in Bengaluru in two years.

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“Nah, I mean, at this early stage in my life, I don’t want to look into stats or where I stand, whether I’m the number one batter or the number 100 batter. You take it one game at a time and just try to play your best cricket. I personally love to keep all these stats aside because I don’t want to get into a mindset where I’m thinking, ‘Okay, I am number one and I need to play in a certain way.’

“It’s not like that — you just need to go out in the middle and enjoy as much as you can. Especially in situations like these, when it’s a decider and there is pressure, you need to enjoy those moments, leave everything else aside, and that’s how we prepare here,” Kishan said in a pre-match chat with the broadcasters.

Kishan, who is set to be India’s vice-captain for the fourth and fifth ODIs against New Zealand next month, described the team’s build-up to the decider as neither too tense nor too relaxed. He said the players were happy to be part of a high-stakes contest after a while.

“No, it’s somewhere in the middle of both. But I know it’s a decider. We haven’t been in this situation recently, and I’m happy to be in this situation because a decider always comes with pressure.

“It comes with expectations and everything, and this is what we want when we go in to bat. You don’t want to be in a situation where it doesn’t matter so much. So, I’m very happy to be in this situation. The most important thing is that we all look to be in a good frame of mind, which is important for every player, and we aim to play good cricket,” he said.

Kishan said the message in the dressing room was to focus on performance rather than the result.

“Looking at this situation, it’s just about playing your best game and not thinking about what’s going to happen.

“Don’t think about the result. The message is simple: just play your game, have that aggression in the field, show intent, have a winning attitude and play your best cricket,” he said.

India’s bowlers have struggled against the West Indies batters in the series, but Kishan declined to blame the batting-friendly pitches or single out individuals. Instead, he stressed the need for the team to work together and execute its plans.

“To be very honest, I feel the wickets have also been very good here. But at the same time, there’s always room for improvement. We cannot always blame the wickets or anything else. I feel we need to work together as a team.

“It’s not like someone had a bad day and we’ll say that whatever happened was because of that particular guy or something. We look at our preparation and the team’s preparation, and all of us need to stand together at every point.

“Right now, it’s about understanding how the other team is playing, what they are trying to achieve as a team, being aware of the situation and conditions, and executing our plans,” he added.