NEW DELHI: Indian batter K L Rahul says he has been trying to improve his game against the old ball to ensure that middle overs generate more runs for his team, which is looking to score in excess of 370 consistently in ODIs amid the growing trend of big targets getting chased down.
Rahul was speaking to 'JioStar' after his 87-ball 129-run knock in the third ODI against the West Indies in which India scored 351.
However, his innings, despite being impressive, could not prevent India's loss in the series finale but the home team had already clinched the rubber by winning the first two games.
"It's not been easy to get 80-90 in the last 10 overs. The ball's been getting reverse swing, and even in this game, once the ball got old and soft, and started to reverse swing, as a batter you don't feel confident enough to take on the long-on and deep mid-wicket fielder if it's a big boundary on that side," he said.
"...I like the hard ball coming onto me, I can use the pace. So that's something I've been working on, trying to play with softer, older balls and being able to hit sixes with that.
"I constantly try to get better within my own game, understand my role, understand what a number five and number six batter has to do to consistently put up performances for the team," he added.
Speaking about the road to the World Cup in South Africa next year, the 34-year-old from Bengaluru said the increasing number of high-scoring games, where even 350 is no longer a safe total, means that the middle-order needs to score quicker than ever to push for a higher score.
The West Indies completed the chase of 352 in 48.2 overs in the third ODI. This was after India chased a record 406 in the second ODI in Guwahati, completing the formalities in just 43.2 overs.
"We don't want to go too far away from the plan but also experiment a little bit as a batting unit. The goal so far has been about can we score 330-340 while batting first, but we're seeing that 340s and 350s get chased down very easily in one-day cricket," he said.
"So how can batters, once set, keep pressing on and get 370s and 380s, or push for 400 on a given day. The minute we as middle-order batters go in, the aim is to ensure that we do not take too much time to get going and start rotating the strike and keep hitting a boundary every six or seven balls.
"The coach and captain have been very clear on the personnel they want to bring in. They want to give a longer rope to certain players who we feel might be important for the World Cup," he explained.
Rahul, who has been batting at number five or six for a while now, said it was important for him to bat long on Saturday as it helped him put to test some of the changes he has made in his approach.
"I wanted to spend more time with the bat out there in the middle and the last time I really got to bat for a long duration in ODI cricket, in the middle-order was in early January this year against New Zealand, and since then I haven't really got a lot of time to play a long innings.
"And next year is a big one, with the World Cup starting in October, so it's important for me to get valuable batting time because off the field I'm trying a few things and I want to test that in the game.
"And only then will you know whether the work that you're putting behind the scenes is working or not, or what I need to do differently. So yeah, it was important for me to get some batting time," he said.