Subsequent to increasing a far-fetched win against Kings XI Punjab (KXIP) in the Indian Premier League (IPL), Rajasthan Royals' batsman Sanju Samson hailed Rahul Tewatia for not surrendering and meeting the challenge at hand when it truly made a difference. His comment came as Rajasthan Royals pursued down a sum of 224 to overcome KXIP by four wickets at the Sharjah Cricket Stadium on Sunday. For Rajasthan Royals, Sanju Samson, Steve Smith, and Rahul Tewatia all scored 50+ scores to give the side a triumph by four wickets. Tewatia came out to bat at number four and he was battling at one phase as he had scored only 13 runs from his initial 19 balls.
Be that as it may, in the eighteenth over bowled by Sheldon Cottrell, Tewatia hit five sixes to switch things around. The left-gave batsman played a thump of 53 as Rajasthan increased an impossible triumph.
"I think it was the team management's decision to send Tewatia at number four," Samson said during the post-match press conference.
"We have been really working hard on Rahul Tewatia. He is a proper leg-spinner (but) the management saw the batting ability he had during the training sessions (and) they decided to send him up the order. It was a brave move and it paid off," he added.
Hailing Tewatia's performance, Samson said: "It was a really good performance from him. Tewatia showed a lot of heart, he never gave up. He was so down and I could see that (but) he had the ability to come back and strike those 30 runs off an international bowler, in the coming tournament he will be crucial to us."
Sanju Samson had played a knock of 74 runs against Chennai Super Kings (CSK), and he lined it up with an 85-run thump against Kings XI Punjab.
Talking about his approach during the chase of 224 against Punjab, Samson said: "During the chase, there was just one way to go. Tt is easier in terms of thought process when you are chasing 220+, it was more about 'see the ball and hit the ball'."
For the match against Punjab, Rajasthan had forgotten about Yashasvi Jaiswal and David Miller to get Ankit Rajpoot and Jos Buttler.
Talking about these selections, Samson said: "Sharjah is tough for bowlers, we wanted to add one more bowler so we left out Yashasvi and we brought in Ankit Rajpoot. Definitely, with Jos Buttler in the squad, he has to play in the team. It's a given and David Miller understood that."