It’s a tough loss to take. MI New York did most things right for a large chunk of the game, and thus losing it off the last ball is sure to hurt. But Head Coach, Mark Boucher, saw the positives to take out of this one, which would serve the team well in the games to come. Excerpts..

On Rusil Ugarkar’s solid comeback 

He came back very nicely after the first game where he took a bit of tap in the first over. He came back under pressure. I don’t think the second over he bowled in that game was bad. We had some conversations to see where he was at. He bowled well in the training sessions as well. Very happy for him that he was able to land it in the area he wanted to land it tonight. He dried the runs out. We’ve seen in this tournament that it can be a bit of a run-fest if the wicket is good, so the bowler is always going to be under the pump. Very happy with the way he performed especially after the first game. 

Whether there could be a strategy to go ahead with only seamers 

Yes, fast bowlers are doing well but are also taking a bit of a pasting. You look at Sunny Patel, he’s done really well for us and he is a leg-spinner but tonight wasn’t his night. It’s about balancing your team out. If you are not bowling 140ks, change of pace is important on these pitches. Execution is really under the microscope when it comes to these smaller grounds. We didn’t execute as well as we wanted to. 

Positives to take from this loss 

Difficult to take positives out of today because it’s a loss. But there are two guys who will take a huge positive for the rest of the tournament. Nicky (Pooran) first of all, his hundred, welcome back to form. It will stand him in good stead going forward. With Tajinder, he hasn’t been given that opportunity in this tournament so far. Our top order has been doing the job. I think he’s only had one or two knocks where he’s spent a bit of time. He’s always been floating in our order. We backed him today. There was a possibility for us to go with an extra bowler, but we stuck with him, which I’m very happy we did. He repaid us with one of the better T20 innings we’ve seen. Very happy for him. He’ll take a lot of confidence from this not only for this tournament but also going forward in his career. Our batting was strong today. The partnership with Nicky was very entertaining to a point where he was taking over. It’s always good to see one of the local guys taking the opportunity. I said it at the start of the tournament as well, the local guys coming in just need a bit of self-belief. That tends to happen in season two, three and four where you get used to mixing with the top players in the world. You look at Monank (Patel) and now Taji, two of the local batters putting their hands up. 

On Tajinder Singh’s growth as a player

As a coach you can sit and have a chat with a player. But the best place to learn is out there in the middle with a guy with the experience like Nicky Pooran. Learning from his calmness and composure at the crease, learning when he needed to pull trigger. Those are priceless lessons you learn in cricket. A lot of these players will take benefit from that and become leaders in the USA team. Well done to Nicky for guiding him. 

On the local USA players doing well 

When I first came here and watched him play in a camp we had, between him and Monank, they were hitting the ball sweetly. We’ve got some other great players in our side too but those two were showing some good form. It’s tough to select a few and leave a few guys out but we ran with those two and they fitted in the dynamics of our structure. Taji didn’t have a chance to bat until this game and we chose to stick with him. I told him he would get the opportunity some time and he took it hands down. He stuck to his guns. He has been working hard off the field.  We’ve had some really good batting meetings as well. He’s the one guy I can see that’s listening. The way he went out and played today shows the things he’s learnt from the batting unit as a whole. He is imparting knowledge to the local players as well. It’s one thing hearing something but going out there and putting it to practice is all him. He needs to take full credit for how he played today. 

On the importance of winning the MLC in the dressing room 

You only have to walk into our dressing room to understand how disappointed the guys are. The guys are gutted which tells me they really care. The importance of this league is massive. It’s going to get bigger and bigger as it grows. The local players are going to get better and start competing. It’s not long before you see a couple of USA players playing in the IPL. There’s a talent pool that’s coming through which is fantastic for the league. The format we are playing is full of action and the American crowds love action-packed events. We need to give it a little more time. The players are certainly coming to the party. We’ve had some fantastic games of cricket, last night’s game, tonight’s game. It’s good for American cricket that you have these times of games. For MI New York, we’d just like to be on the winning side of one of them pretty soon.