Twenty minutes of madness made the difference: Gilchrist

Adam Gilchrist said after KXIP's second straight defeat in the DLF-IPL-V that it's difficult for any team to play “flawless Twenty20.”

“I have not seen it; certainly it's difficult to see it happen over a stretch of 16 games. I am yet to see a team play a perfect game. Any team can beat any other team,” said Gilchrist.

KXIP had lost the first league match to Rajasthan Royals and Gilchrist has to find quick solutions to turn around the fortunes of his team.

KXIP and PWI clash again at Mohali on April 12. “I don't want to get into scheduling issues; in an ideal world one team would have played the other once at the half way point. It's all part of the tournament. Back-to-back (with the same team) doesn't matter too much,” said the KXIP skipper.

He attributed the loss to PWI to 10 minutes of madness at the end of his team's bowling (left-arm spinner Bipul Sharma and Harmeet Singh conceding 27 runs in the 19th over) and 10 minutes of madness at the start of the KXIP innings (run outs of Paul Valthaty and Gilchrist).

“There's no doubt that the big finish (conceding 35 runs in the last two overs) made a big difference. It slipped out of his hands, nothing intentional (about Harmeet being punished for sending two beamers in the 19th and replaced by Sharma). I made a bad call and Paul was out. Yes 20 minutes of bad cricket cost us the game,'' said Gilchrist.

Gilchrist said he enjoyed playing IPL and that's why he kept coming back. “I am pretty fortunate to have experienced a lot of things in my cricketing career and had the fortune of winning the IPL (for Deccan Chargers).”

He praised the people who have created a fine cricketing facility at Gahunje village off the Pune-Mumbai Expressway.

“It's a fantastic stadium. But the wicket will take some time to settle down and establish. There are going to be issues related to the pitch; one ball almost rolled after pitching. In a big game that could have become decisive. But this is one of the good venues that've come up all over the country,” said Gilchrist.