66 no less than a century: When batter Akash Deep thrilled Shubman Gill, teammates
The Indian captain revealed that there has been constant banter between the batters and bowlers in the team. He said that the batters constantly keep telling the tailenders to contribute with some runs and the Indian captain felt that Akash settled all the scores with his knock. "For a long time, there's always been this banter going on between us. The batters keep saying, 'You lower-order bowlers, contribute a bit, man.' What to say — I think in this match, they settled all scores with us," said Gill. Akash certainly got a lot of tips along the way with batting coach Sitanshu Kothak and KL Rahul revealing what they told the pacer ahead of Day 3. Kothak said that he told Akash to go for a big shot if the ball was in his arc, rather than defending. "Yesterday when he was in the lift after we reached the hotel, I told him — 'Akash, if you get it in the slot tomorrow, just hit it. Don't defend compulsorily, because in the last two innings you got out defending,'" said Kothak. Rahul said that he advised Akash to think like a batter and not to throw his wicket away. "Yeah, this morning, just had a brief chat and told him to think like a batter and, you know, not throw his wicket away," said KL Rahul. Jaiswal and Prasidh Krishna also praised Akash for his knock in the video. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Team India (@indiancricketteam)'I'm not going to get out'Akash revealed his mindset during the knock and said that he told himself that he was not going to get out and throw away his wicket. "Last night when I went to sleep, my mindset was that I'm not going to get out. If the ball gets me out, that's a different thing — but I won't throw my wicket. Even if the ball hits the body or hits anywhere, I have to play. Where there was a need to play the ball, I did. With Jaiswal, we had a partnership of over 100 runs — so that's very special for me," said Akash. Akash said, while the fifty was dear to him, the knock was made special by the fact that he spent more than two hours in the middle for the team. "That fifty is special for me, but more special than that is that I played two hours in the morning for the team — that is very special for me," said Akash. The knock from Akash even brought out a smile from India coach Gautam Gambhir as it gave India the advantage on the day. - EndsTune InMust Watch
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