We were outplayed by a quality Indian side: Trent Boult

New Zealand speedster Trent Boult praised 17-year-old batsman Prithvi Shaw on Tuesday after he scored 66 and played an instrumental role in the 30-run win for the Indian Board President’s XI in the warm-up game.

Prithvi was pulled out of the India U19 team, which is set to travel to Malaysia for the Asia Cup, and was asked to open for the Indian Board President’s XI against the Kiwis. This was the first time that Shaw was facing a senior international side, but the Mumbai youngster impressed one and all as he combined with KL Rahul to raise a 147-run stand. The New Zealand A side had found it tough to counter the India A team but the senior team too looked clueless against the Indian tweakers.

“I heard he was 17, I couldn’t quite believe it. He played very nicely. The ball swung around nicely at the start, and it didn’t seem to trouble him. He has a promising career ahead of him, if all things go well. But very impressed from the first look,” said Boult, as reported by Hindustan Times.

Outplayed by a quality side

Boult was quick to admit that, though it was an outing where the Kiwis got the opportunity to get acclimatized to the Indian conditions because they are touring the sub-continent after a year, it was outplayed by the Indian side. Karun Nair was also among the runs as he registered a 78 off 64 balls. Shahbaz Nadeem, who had a good A series against New Zealand recently, once again had the best figures of 3/41 with the ball.

“It’s satisfying to re-familiarise ourselves with the conditions here. It was very hot this afternoon, but it’s disappointing to not come away with a win. It’s tough. It’s just what is expected in this part of the world. It’s about 7-8 degrees in NZ at the moment, so it’s a bit of a shock to the system to come here; 9.30 start and to play throughout the heat was a challenge. But we were outplayed by a quality Indian side,” added the NZ pacer.

Bowlers plans failing

The Kiwi pacers worked on their strategy of bowling more short balls, but didn’t get a lot of success as admitted by Boult himself. It was him who ruled the New Zealand’s bowling chart with a 5-fer but apart from him, the remaining eight bowlers who tried their hand with the ball rarely found success.

On the strategy, the left-arm pacer said, “Good opportunities to try different tactics in terms of a bowling plan. To come here and try bowl good line and length against some of the best players in the world is probably not the best recipe in getting them out.”

All of Boult’s wickets came with the old ball and hence, he emphasized on the importance of taking wickets at the top of the innings. Known to trouble batsmen with a bit of swing, Boult added that the batsmen negated with it well resulting in the trouble taking wickets in quick succession.

“The ball did what we wanted to do in terms of swing and good line and length, but they kept it out easily. So, coming back and taking wickets in clumps is important for us. Today, it worked in parts and not in some,” concluded Boult.