Aakash Chopra praised Sunil Narine. He liked Narine’s all-around skills. This was during KKR’s loss to RR in IPL 2024.
Narine scored 109 runs off 56 deliveries as KKR set RR a massive 224-run mark in Kolkata on Tuesday, April 16. Although the spin-bowling all-rounder grabbed two wickets and a catch, Jos Buttler’s unbeaten 107 from 60 deliveries helped the visitors win by two wickets on the penultimate delivery.
Chopra said in a YouTube video review of the game that Sunil Narine delivered a heavenly performance the day before Ram Navami.
“Rajasthan’s players became available. There was a slight niggle, so Jos Buttler came as an impact player and Ravichandran Ashwin played. However, a storm came from the other end. The storm’s name was Sunil Narine. He chose the Ram Navami day and did Narayan Narayan to everyone.”
Aakash Chopra
The former India opener said that the West Indian all-rounder will be disappointed that his outstanding effort came in a losing cause.
“He hit a lot. I will once again say as a broken record that he has power and the ability to hit but you don’t relate consistency with him. However, the way he is batting and doing it consistently, he became the first player to score a century, take a wicket, actually took two and not one wicket, and a catch but they still lost the match.”
“It was an injustice. If you perform like this and you still lose the match, it pains a lot because you did everything. One-man army – you took on the entire universe but that was also not enough.”
Aakash Chopra
Narine hammered 13 fours and six sixes during his 109-run innings. He also grabbed a wonderful catch to remove Sanju Samson and bowled out Dhruv Jurel and Rovman Powell. However, his overall performance was in vain.
Aakash Chopra Comments on Ravichandran Ashwin’s Approach to Bowling Against Sunil Narine
Evaluating the Royals’ bowling strategy, Aakash Chopra challenged Ravichandran Ashwin’s approach against Sunil Narine’s batting.
“Ravichandran Ashwin was bowling wides. He was bowling far away from him (Narine). It’s said that it’s better to be late than have an accident but from Ashwin’s bowling, it seemed like it was better to stay away from an accident. So many extras – Shahrukh Khan was saying that he doesn’t use so many extras in his songs these days.”
Aakash Chopra
The reputable analyst stated that RR’s bowling was fairly mediocre. He also questioned why they only fielded five frontline bowlers despite having the benefit of the Impact Player rule.