"Embarrassing": Kumar Sangakkara after Rajasthan Royals' defeat in low-scoring encounter against Gujarat Titans
Jaipur, Rajasthan: Rajasthan Royals coach Kumar Sangakkara termed the team's performance against the defending champions Gujarat Titans as "extremely poor" and "embarrassing".
Rajasthan succumbed to a total of 118 in 17.5 overs in the Indian Premier League match against GT on the home turf. The GT batters didn't even break a sweat while chasing the target, as they registered a comfortable 9-wicket victory to reclaim the top spot in the group stage.
Throughout the match, Rajasthan struggled to build on the openings that they created.
"It is embarrassing for anyone when you don't play well," Sangakkara said after the match.
"But we've got to accept the fact that we were extremely poor today. And that's the first step. You realise it, accept it, and then try to come up with the solutions to what the problems are," he added.
The coach said that RR did show intent. however, were "reckless".
"We were very, very poor in terms of capitalising on the starts we got. We were showing intent for a while, but we were a little bit reckless, and then we had very, very little intent against the two spinners. Rashid bowled brilliantly, I thought Noor bowled really well as well, but that's the time the batters need to step up and show more and more intent," Sangakkara said.
Even after falling short of registering a par total on the board, RR still had a chance to turn the tables around with their lethal bowling lineup.
Gujarat Titans have already failed once while chasing a low score of 131. RR had an opportunity to steal the game from the jaws of defeat.
"Even a defence in T20 cricket has to have the intent of wanting to score. You work down the sequence of 6, 4, 3, 2, 1; or, if you're under pressure, you go 4, 3, 2, 1. But you are always looking for opportunities to score, and at the minimum, getting off strike," he said.
"And once that intent is shown, it doesn't matter how good a bowler you are, you are always thinking that you can't give the batter anything loose because you're going to get put away. So that's one area that we've got to really look at," the former Sri Lanka captain added.
Rajasthan Royals will try to find their way back to the winning ways as they lock horns with Sunrisers Hyderabad on Sunday.
