WI vs NZ: Sherfane Rutherford chuffed with playing dream innings in ...

West Indies vs New Zealand: Sherfane Rutherford played one of the best innings of the T20 World Cup 2024, hitting 68* off just 39 balls vs NZ. Rutherford spoke about his heroic innings at the press conference and what it meant to him and his team.

Sherfane Rutherford plays a shot vs NZ. (AP Photo)

West Indies batter Sherfane Rutherford played one of the most significant innings in his cricketing career on Thursday, 13 June against New Zealand. Playing a crucial Group C encounter, Rutherford scored 68* off 39 balls to guide the co-hosts to a winning total. Rutherford's knock was important as it propelled the Windies to the Super 8 stages and also effectively knocked out New Zealand, who have 0 points from 2 matches.

Windies were drawn into a group with T20 specialists in Afghanistan and New Zealand, along with associate nations PNG and Uganda. Rutherford's knock was special as it came at a time when the Windies thought that they had lost all hopes. Windies were down to 76/7 in the 13th over of the match. Staring at a fairly obvious defeat, Rutherford said no, and played one of the best knocks of his career. Rutherford held on to one side and slammed NZ in the final few overs of the first innings. From 103/8 in the 17th over, West Indies finished with 149/9.

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Rutherford spoke about his innings, and dubbed it as the best that he has played in his cricketing career.

"I would put it at my best knock. It's a World Cup, this is my dream. I always wanted to play World Cup, I always want to perform in World Cup and I think this one's going to stay close to my heart and hopefully I can continue to take out good innings like this for my team and for myself," Rutherford said in the post-match press conference.

Speaking about the rotation of strike in tough phases of the game, Rutherford said that it is something that West Indies had worked on collectively.

"I think, it's something that we work hard on. We have our meetings about rotating strike. It's a bit difficult in this tournament, I would say, so far because of the tough wickets. But as a team, our goal is to lessen that buzz. And I think good intent is one thing that we spoke a lot about. And you're going to see a lot of rotation from us. We're going to try our best even though it's a tough surface but we're going to keep trying and trying because we can only try our best and that's our best maybe now," Rutherford said.

T20 World Cup 2024: WI vs NZ Match Report

Rutherford argued that West Indies had been playing good cricket and had three different players step up in three games in the tournament. Rutherford was part of KKR in the Indian Premier League 2024 and said that he had taken a lot of learning from the tournament.

"We have been playing good cricket. There are good days and bad days and one thing I learned that a team that's going to win any tournament, going to be different players stepping up on each time. And I think for the past three games, it have been three different players. So, I'm not concerned because that's what champion team do. I was at the IPL and I observed a lot of things. And that was one of the key that stick with me. And it's just for us to keep building on our strength and keep improving our game and I think that's going to be the key for us," Rutherford concluded.

West Indies have won three out of three matches in the tournament so far and have qualified for the next stage of the tournament.