Moody happy to continue with Kane as opener

 

Mumbai: Defending the decision to persist with the out-of-form Kane Williamson at the top, Sunrisers Hyderabad coach Tom Moody said "why change something that's working for something that's not working," adding that the other batters in the side are excelling in their roles.

Skipper Williamson is enduring a wretched run in this season of the IPL. The Kiwi has collected just 208 runs from 12 games at an average of 18.92.

"Rahul Tripathi has batted exceptionally well at No 3 and (Aiden) Markram has been one of the leading batters in the tournament at No 4," Moody defended the move to retain Markram and Tripathi at No 3 and 4 respectively, at the post-match press conference.

"So, we felt why change something that's working for something that's not working."

Williamson has struggled to get going in this edition. In the 54-run loss to Kolkata Knight Riders on Saturday, the skipper hit 9 off 17 balls.

"We have trusted Kane with his quality, there's no question of his world-class quality. So, that's why we haven't made that move because as we have seen throughout the tournament where the batting has been functioning really well.

"That is Abhishek Sharma at the top of the order, Tripathi at 3, Markram 4 and (Nicholas) Pooran 5."

The Sunrisers were on course to seal off a playoff berth after they were on a five-match winning streak, but things have gone awry for them since then as they have now lost five games on the trot, severely denting their hopes of qualifying for the next stage.

"We did get on a nice winning roll, started to play some good cricket and had everyone available for selection and then we missed a game that we should've won to make it six in a row," Moody said.

Moody said the team lost "a little bit of confidence" when the two of its frontline bowlers -- Washington Sundar and T Natarajan -- suffered injuries.

"Then we had injuries to Washington and Natarajan. Every team has their injuries, but they play pretty key roles for us in the side and that's where I think we lost a little bit of confidence and also as a bowling unit a bit of rhythm to our game and method to our defence of 120 balls." (Agencies)