Brian Lara laments SRH’s inability to finish matches

Sunrisers Hyderabad’s woeful home record in IPL 2023 was prolonged after they suffered a damaging defeat against a clinical Lucknow Super Giants in the first of two matches on Saturday, May 13. Following their loss, head coach Brian Lara lamented his side’s result, feeling the Orange Army should be placed much higher at the points table.

Aiden Markram’s side has lost seven of their 11 matches so far and are staring down the barrel of yet another disappointing campaign in the IPL. But they have got only themselves to blame as they squandered a few decent chances in their previous outings. The game against LSG was played on similar lines as the home side were on top of the proceeding for much of the contest.

However, Krunal Pandya’s side upped the ante in the death overs to clinch a memorable victory. Following SRH’s defeat, head coach and batting icon Brian Lara lamented on their inability to close off matches, which cost them crucial points leading up to the game against Lucknow. Even though the Hyderabad-based outfit are currently in ninth position after that loss, Lara is still hopeful of making it to the playoff.

“It’s a situation where we should be sitting down pretty high on this table. We’ve had some close games and games that entering the final strides of the game, we were ahead. And we did not close it off. It’s fair to say we could have been well-placed in this tournament and it’s not the case now. We’ve got three games left and we’ve got to get the guys motivated to get results in these three games,” Lara said after the defeat against LSG.

It was a stage where we had one over of spin to bowl: Brian Lara

The former cricketer also gave his thoughts on the much-talked-about Abhishek Sharma’s 16th over, which yielded 31 runs, changing the complexion of the match in just six deliveries. Lara backed his captain’s decision as he felt the team needed a spinner to bowl that over.

“I suppose you can say that now, in hindsight. Obviously, it did not work out for us. It was a stage where we had one over of spin to bowl. We always back our fast bowlers to get the job done. So we knew that one over was going to be attacked. Unfortunately, all six or seven balls they had an opportunity to score,” he added.