After his side suffered their first defeat at the hands of Rajasthan Royals in this edition of the Indian Premier League, Chennai Super Kings coach Stephen Fleming has admitted his team was thoroughly outplayed by a better opponent.
"Rajasthan is the clear leader at the moment. It is always tough to beat them when they are full of confidence. In addition, they were playing in their home ground, which is already known to them," he explained.
The former New Zealand captain said that his team was 20 runs short and that the total of 156 they scored was not good enough against a confident team like Rajasthan. He also said that Rajasthan outplayed Chennai in all departments of the game and also expressed concern about his team's performance in fielding.
"The match was pretty one sided. We were outplayed by Rajasthan in every department. We need to improve a lot in fielding department, as we have not concentrated much on it. I can say that we were around 20 run short due to some hiccups in the beginning. We are surely pretty disappointed," Fleming added.
Even as the mercury hovered at 43 degrees Celsius when the Chennai came out to bat, Fleming said that heat conditions were not responsible for their defeat, as they have played in such conditions earlier.
"We have played in such conditions in Mumbai and Chennai, so heat doesn't have to do anything. We did what we can do, but, it's just the nature of IPL cricket where players sometimes may not perform well due to the mental and physical strain they take," said the former New Zealand captain.
On his side's bowling performance, Fleming said, "Rajasthan created pressure on us when they were bowling. Unfortunately, we could not do the same when we came to bowl."
