Going by the strength of the opposition, Tamil Nadu’s quarterfinal against Karnataka last week could well have been dubbed as the summit clash by the staunchest of its supporters. After stunning Karnataka inside two days, Tamil Nadu now has to best domestic powerhouse Mumbai if it is to make the final.
Tamil Nadu captain Abhinav Mukund preferred to live in the present after his team’s last training session here. “History is what other players have played.
“This is a fresh start,” he said, when told that the team has not registered an outright victory against Mumbai away from home.
“A lot of people said this about Karnataka which I wasn’t aware of (that we had not beaten them in knock-outs or something like that). It is a fresh start, new ball, new wicket and new team.
“We are just going to go out there and do whatever we can do best.”
The leadership group of Abhinav, head coach Hrishikesh Kanitkar and bowling coach L. Balaji, with the aid of a senior pro like Dinesh Karthik, has managed to inculcate the policy of playing the opposition rather than opponents in a young team.
“The good thing about this team is that we are not too worried about the opponents because most of them haven’t played such opponents before and I am quite pleased with the fact that we were up against quite a strong Karnataka team and I think we did not play the players but played the game as it was,” said Abhinav.
Considering the lacklustre form of most Mumbai regulars, perhaps it will serve Tamil Nadu better if it reverses the policy over the next five days.
