Indian captain Suryakumar Yadav has revealed that they purposely played with six batters and five specialist bowlers combination in the fourth T20I against New Zealand. The hosts suffered a 50-run loss after they were bowled out for 165 while chasing 216.

SKY said they wanted to challenge themselves against the Kiwis after taking an impregnable lead of 3-0 in the series. Furthermore, Yadav decided to bowl first after winning the toss at Visakhapatnam on Wednesday.

“I feel we purposely played six batters today. We wanted to have five perfect bowlers and wanted to challenge ourselves. Like for example, if we’re chasing 200 or 180, and we wanted to see if we were two down or three down, how does it look? But then it’s fine at the end of the day. And we wanted to play all the players who are part of the World Cup squad. Otherwise, we would have played other ones,” Surya said in the post-match press conference.

The Indian skipper said they wanted to chase 180-200 as they have batted really well while batting first and thus wanted a different challenge.

“We’ve been batting really well when we’ve batted first. So I wanted the guys to take that responsibility if we’re chasing 180 or 200, and two wickets or three wickets are down and see how we bat. So it’s a good challenge. Hopefully, if we get an opportunity again, we might chase again. But at the end of the day, good learning,” he added.

On the other hand, Shivam Dube scored a blistering knock of 65 runs off just 23 balls and SKY added it could have been a different story if one more batter had supported the left-hander.

“With the heavy dew, I think one or two partnerships here and there, like the way Dube batted, one batter with him would have made a lot of difference at the end of the game. I think 50 runs, we lost by 50 runs. But it’s okay. As I said, one or two partnerships like this in a run-chase like this might make a difference,” he concluded.

The fifth and final T20I between India and New Zealand will be played at Thiruvanthapuram on Saturday.