Sunrisers Hyderabad medium pacer Sandeep Sharma defended his team's fragile middle-order and its tendency to fall apart in the ongoing IPL, saying it is not wise to form opinions after "one failure".
SRH suffered a six-wicket defeat at the hands of Kings XI Punjab here Monday night, with opener David Warner again emerging as their top scorer.
The batsmen in the middle did get starts but could not go on to score big.
On the middle-order woes facing his team, Sharma said: "The fact is that our opening pair has been batting so good that middle order was not tested. Even in this game, Warner played through, only in one game the middle order collapsed and from one game alone an opinion cannot be formed.
"We have talented batsman in middle order -- Yusuf Pathan, Mohd Nabi, Deepak Hooda, Manish Pandey."
The seamer said, "It had rained in the morning, wicket had moisture because of which batting was a bit tough. In the end (when SRH was bowling) heavy dew was a big factor, ball was getting wet. The batting (KXIP) was easy in second half than first half."
"With Bhuvneshwar Kumar and me as swing bowlers, the plan was to take wickets, but in second half heavy dew caused problem. As the match progressed, we tried to remain in contest, we tried to take wickets, but at the end of the day K L (Rahul) played a match-winning knock."
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