Rishabh Pant often cops flak for not being able to take his team past the finishing line but Delhi Capitals scouting head Pravin Amre feels the criticism is uncalled for as "you cannot curtail the natural instincts of a special player like him".
After Delhi's successful IPL campaign which saw them reach the play-offs for the first time since 2012, Amre spoke to PTI about what worked for the team this season.
Talking about Pant first, Amre said the young keeper-batsman took the disappointment of not making India's World Cup squad on the chin.
In the end, he was the team's leading run-scorer with 488 runs in 16 games at 37.53 and one of his match-winning knocks came against Sunrisers Hyderabad in the eliminator, where he took the team on the cusp of a famous win before getting out.
"I saw Rishabh three years ago (when he joined Delhi) and when I see him now, I feel a lot of good has happened to him. He has got that x-factor and he can win games singlehandedly on his day," Amre, a former India batsman, told PTI.
"If you talking about his finishing skills, he himself is aware (that he needs to finish games more often). When you are a match winner you have take on the opposition in this format. You can't player safe cricket, you have to take risks. With these type of players, you really have to mould them properly. You can't tinker with their natural game. They play on instincts."
"I would also give credit to the players who were able to execute their plans this season. Important roles played by Shikhar, Shreyas, Pant and Rabada. The team believed it could cross the line which wasn't the case earlier. We were as good as anybody in the league stage. We were always underdogs but we played fearless cricket and that paid off."
"Big reason why we gelled well was that 70 percent of the players who played last year were around this season too."