Shreyas Iyer Lauds Rohit Sharma for His Motivation Under Pressure

India thrashed Bangladesh by 30 runs in the third and final match to clinch the three-match T20I series by 2-1 on Sunday. While Shreyas Iyer stepped up with the bat it was Deepak Chahar with the ball who became the first Indian male cricketer to a take a hat-trick in T20Is.

After having posted 174 for five, India found themselves under the pressure as Bangladesh started doing well despite losing two wickets very early. However, according to Shreyas Iyer, when the team was in the pressure, their captain Rohit Sharma gave a pep talk.

“We were feeling the pressure. We know that they are a really good team. There’s no team in T20 that we can underestimate. And in the previous two games we have seen that the quality of cricket they have been playing was really mesmerising,” said Iyer.

“We were going a little lethargic at the start, but once they started going, Rohit called all the players inside the circle and he gave us a pep talk, which was really motivating. After that we were all determined to win the game,” he further added.

Shreyas Iyer played a crucial knock for India after Bangladesh had won the toss and elected to bowl first in Nagpur. After losing Rohit Sharma and Shikhar Dhawan very cheaply, KL Rahul and Shreyas Iyer added 59 runs for the third wicket. Shreyas Iyer top-scored with 62 runs off mere 33 balls, including three consecutive sixes.

“The over in which I hit three sixes changed the momentum of the match. Otherwise, we would have got 150 and that would have been a really tough total too difficult on this wicket. Yeah, I would give myself a credit, playing that role. It was important for one of the top three batters to stay at the crease till the 15th over,” shared Shreyas Iyer.

Both the teams will now play the two-match Test series which will begin on Thursday at the Holkar Cricket Stadium in Indore. Following that, both the teams will play the first-ever Day-Night Test in Kolkata.