|| India Correspondent ||

Kolkata Knight Riders captain Eoin Morgan has applauded his team's selfless behaviour, referring to Harbhajan Singh's involvement in the game despite bowling only one over in KKR's win over Sunrisers Hyderabad in their first game in IPL 2021 in Chennai on Sunday.

“We’re blessed that we have guys buying into what we want to do. Bhajji starting really well in the first over and then not playing a part but using his experience to get around the guys in the game shows the selflessness in the side,” Morgan said at the post-match presentation.

The captain also praised the stunning knocks of Nitish Rana and Rahul Tripathi. While Rana smashed a blistering 80, Tripathi scored 53 as well.

"Delighted with the win," he said. "Build up to the tournament has been pretty good. The camp that we had pre-tournament, the guys gelled well but never quite sure what performance they will produce in the match. Today was quite magnificent the way the guys batted. Guys at the top of the order. Nitish and Tripathi were absolutely outstanding and set up the game for our middle order to play in the manner we want to play."

"Certainly the bowling, we couldn’t have asked for a better start. Chopped and changed a bit in the powerplay. There’s huge amount of structure that goes into the decisions on the field. Have got a fantastic head coach in McCullum. Great back room staff. Main job is to get the best out of the squad. IPL is all about the results. Nice to start like this it’s obviously a long tournament. We were very happy with the score. We thought if we bowled half-decently we should get over the line," he concluded.