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Bangladesh v India, Group B, Trinidad
'Our backs are up against the wall' - Dravid
Cricinfo staff
March 17, 2007
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Rahul Dravid admitted that the batting came a cropper on a seaming pitch
© AFP
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Rahul Dravid, the captain, says India will have to play out of their skins to qualify for the Super Eights following their shock defeat to Bangladesh. Dravid blamed the batting for the loss and said they were 30 to 40 runs short as Bangladesh chased down the required 192 to win by five wickets.
The chase was fashioned by half-centuries to the young brigade of Tamim Iqbal, Mushfiqur Rahim and Saqibul Hasan. "Our backs are up against the wall," Dravid said. "We didn't get enough runs on the board. I thought 240 would have been a good score but the wicket surprised us.
"Their bowlers kept it really tight and they didn't let us get away. We know we've got to win two games now. We've got our backs to the wall and have got to fight pretty hard." India now have to beat both Bermuda, on Monday, and Sri Lanka, on Friday, to avoid the risk of elimination.
He also defended his decision to bat first on a pitch which had plenty of bounce and movement, which was fully utilised by the Bangladesh seamers, Mashrafe Mortaza and Syed Rasel.
"I don't know if we can regret it," he said. "We could have just batted a lot better. The ball did seam around a lot more and for a bit longer than we had expected. The wicket had a pretty dry look about it."
Dravid's counterpart, Habibul Bashar, was upbeat and gave due credit to the bowlers who set up the victory. After losing the toss, Mortaza picked up two early wickets, before the spinners made life difficult for the middle order. Mortaza picked up two further wickets in his second spell to clean up the tail and restrict India to less than 200.
"The boys did a terrific job - it was a good toss to lose," Bashar said. "When I saw the wicket I was in two minds. Because we only played with two seamers we knew we needed to take a wicket early and Mashrafe did that. Playing against a team like India you have to work hard - and this will give us a fair chance to qualify for the second round. It's a great day for Bangladesh."
© Cricinfo
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