We are peaking at the right time: Smith

TIL Desk Sports/ After consolidating their fourth spot in the table, courtesy Ben Stokes’ unbeaten 103, Rising Pune Supergiant skipper Steve Smith feels they are “peaking at the right time”. RPS beat Gujarat Lions by five wickets after a top-order collapse and now stand pretty at fourth spot with 12 points.

“It wasn’t an ideal start but we have some artillery in the shed. MS and Stoksy took it deep. It is one of the easier ground to his sixes and Stokesy made use of it. I thought it was a great effort for the bowlers to pull it back to 160. We are peaking at the right time, hopefully not early,” Smith said after the match.

“Stoksy is a quality player and he certainly earned his cash. Fantastic player and very proud of him.” Stokes, who added 76 runs for the fifth wicket with former India captian MS Dhoni to repair the innings, said their plan was to rotate the strike. “We lost quite a few early wickets… me and MS just tried to keep it ticking. Numbers game: we just tried to go big at the start of the over and cool it off,” he said.