Mirpur: South African captain Faf du Plessis lavished praise on Virat Kohli, stating that the talented right-hander was "too good" for his side, which failed to do "small things correctly" in its ICC World T20 semifinal against India in Mirpur on Friday.
"He (Virat) was fantastic. We all know how good Virat is and he was the real danger. He paced his innings well and played some good shots. He was too good for us," Du Plessis said after his team's six-wicket defeat to India.
The skipper was miffed with the manner his bowlers gave away nine extra deliveries during the innings. "If you look at it like this -- we did not do the small things correctly which put us on the backfoot. We bowled nine extra deliveries. It's not only about the extra deliveries we bowled but also about the amount of runs scored from those deliveries. We were a little bit indisciplined today."
Du Plessis defended premier speedster Dale Steyn's indifferent performance. "Dale is also human. It's hard to expect that he would win us matches everyday. He did not bowl badly today but the Indian batsmen were upto the task."
The skipper gave a nice reply when he was asked about whether he regrets giving Wayne Parnell the 17th over, which turned the match decisively in India's favour. "You can look at it from both ways. You would have been asking me the same question had Parnell bowled the 18th over and got hit for runs!"
"We have to admit that their batsmen outskilled us today. We always knew that Dale had to bowl the 18th and the 20th over."
The skipper showed his defiance and said that in this South African line-up, AB de Villiers will normally come in after 10 overs rather than at the No 3 position. "Statistically we have seen that AB is at his best when he comes into bat after 10 overs in the innings. When he has come out to bat earlier, it has not been that good. And if you are saying that AB could have batted faster than JP and me, I don't know," he said.
The skipper said that the idea behind opening the bowling with Duminy was to exploit the gripping nature of the track. "When India opened with two seamers, we thought that they had missed a trick. The idea to start with Duminy came from that but we saw that the ball started skidding a bit."
Du Plessis also praised the Sher-e-Bangla track, terming it a good wicket. "This was a good wicket. In Chittagong, the ball did not turn much. Ashwin today really bowled well. He is a good bowler. Immy (Imran Tahir) got a chance to measure himself against these guys. It was really a good game of cricket," he concluded.
