Abu Dhabi:Delhi Capitals skipper Shreyas Iyer on Saturday urged his teammates to toughen up their minds after they crashed to a 59-run loss at the hands of Kolkata Knight Riders, a rare poor show for the side this IPL season.
Chasing a massive 194/6, which KKR posted courtesy half-centuries by Nitish Rana (81) and Sunil Narine (64), DC were held to 135/9 as mystery spinner Varun Chakravarthy (5-20) wrecked the in-form line-up. Delhi have won seven of their 11 games so far.
"We need to be strong in our mind and play with freedom, not have a survival mindset," Iyer told official broadcaster in the post-match presentation ceremony.
"...we could've put more pressure on them and we could've gone more attacking but the way they played in between especially Sunil Narine coming and changing the momentum towards them.
"I think that was the changing point and also we could've bowled in perfect areas, we couldn't execute our plans," he added.
Ricky Ponting with Shreyas Iyer