Virender Sehwag
The stand in Indian Captain talks to the press at the end of the test match in Napier.
On Gautam Gambhir’s innings…
“I think Gautam played a life-time innings. He played for almost 11 hours I think he was the one who saved the game for us. I think we can call him the second wall of the Indian cricket team.”
On being confident of lasting two days…
“Yes. I think we’ve done it a couple of times. We did it against Australia in the 1999/2000 series and we did it in Adelaide in 2004 and we won the game. So we were very sure we could bat through the two – two and a half days.”
On being disappointed in his own performance…
“Not much. Sometimes you get runs, sometimes you don’t. I’m a team man and you know we saved the test match for India.”
On the feeling in the dressing room…
“We were very strong when we knew that we had a couple of players that can bat for two days. Laxman, Dravid, Gautam, Sachin Tendulkar can bat for two days so the dressing room atmosphere was fantastic. No one thought that we would lose the game. We were enjoying ourselves, playing football after the game or before the game so we were very sure.”
On the BLACKCAPS bowlers performance in the next match being affected by the workload…
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“Maybe because they worked hard to win the test but unfortunately they couldn’t win this match.”
On the flat wicket…
“It was a flat track with nothing for the bowlers except the bounce. When the wicket has bounce it is good for the batsmen also. They can play their shots and that’s why we saw four of five hundreds in the game.”
On whether the Indian bowlers would have done better than the BLACKCAPS…
“I don’t think so.”
On whether he considered it a good test pitch…
“Yes, I can say that because there was a lot of bounce on this track. There was not much spin or seam movement but a lot of bounce.”
On if the pitch needed more than just bounce…
“I don’t think so. We have played on flatter than this in India or maybe abroad.”
On the Indian team coming off the pitch smiling after a draw…
“I think that we are getting used to this. In the last seven months we have won every test series. We are playing good cricket and backing ourselves. It doesn’t matter was situation we are in we just go and play our game. We are not bothered about the situation or the conditions. We are just in our own space and can do want we want to do.”
On preparation for the next test…
“For the next test match we will have to work hard. It depends on the wicket – on what type of wicket we get. Hopefully we will do well in the next game.”
On the availability of Dhoni…
“I don’t know yet but maybe he’ll find out after today.”
