Mumbai, Nov 26: An incredible 17 wickets fell on the last day of the third Test and a baffled India skipper Mahendra Singh says he has no idea what happened to the Wankhede track which had nothing to offer to spinners till the fourth day.
West Indies lost eight wickets in their second innings to collapse to 134 and India lost nine batsmen in pursuit of a victory target of 243 to eventually fall short by just one run.
“Frankly I don't know what happened. It started to turn in the morning. Till yesterday evening everything was fine. It was among the flattest wickets. I'm seriously saying, am not joking something happened in the morning and it started to turn. Most of us thought it will be a draw but somehow it turned into a tie. It was a close game as the scorebook suggests,” Dhoni said after winning the series 2-0.
The Indian captain said it became extremely difficult to play strokes as the ball was not coming on to the bat.
“There was a bit of bounce for the spinners and for the fast bowlers the ball was stopping a bit. Once you look to play a shot you had to be careful that you are at the pitch of the ball. If you are not you saw batsmen getting caught at mid wicket or covers,” he said.
Dhoni said their strategy was to run as hard as possible to keep the scoreboard ticking as boundaries were hard to come by.
“It was quite easy to stay on the wicket but difficult to score runs. A few of us thought if we can rotate and get singles it would become a bit easy as the game progresses. No one dismissal was the turning point but it was a good game of cricket in the end,” he said. PTI
