Chahar justified Dravid”s decision to promote him, his batting was amazing: Bhuvneshwar

TIL Desk Sports/ India vice-captain Bhuvneshwar Kumar said it was coach Rahul Dravid”s decision to send Deepak Chahar up the order and he justified it with an “amazing” knock to guide the team to a stunning three-wicket win against Sri Lanka in the second ODI here. Chahar hit an unbeaten 69 and stitched an unbroken match-winning 84-run stand with Bhuvneshwar (19) for the eight wicket to help India take an unassailable 2-0 lead in the three-ODI series.

“…Our aim was to play till the last ball, last over, so we wanted to take it as deep as possible, so we can score runs. The only plan was to play till the last, and the way Deepak batted was amazing,” Bhuvneshwar said at the post-match virtual press conference late Tuesday night. “Look, he has played under coach Rahul Dravid before in India A or some series and he had scored there as well. So, Dravid knew that he can bat and he can hit a few balls, so that was his Dravid”s call.

“And the way he batted, Chahar proved it right. We all know that he can bat, he has batted in Ranji Trophy many times, so it wasn”t a tough call but it is good to see the way he scored the runs.” Chasing 276 to win, India was teetering at 193 for 7 but Chahar and Bhuvneshwar helped India record a memorable win with five balls to spare. “The only chat and plan was to play till the end. We never said to each other that from here on, we can win. Even when we needed 1 run (3 runs), we were taking one ball at a time. Deepak never let the run rate go above six,” Bhuvneshwar said.