Tikolo says India match proves Kenya is up to scratch

CAPE TOWN, South Africa, March 7 AP - Steve Tikolo expects Kenya's gallant performance against India will silence the critics who have sneered at the African minnows for advancing to the Super Six through the back door.

"Obviously the performance is there for them to see," the Kenyan skipper told reporters today after a fighting, six-wicket loss in their first Super Six game.

Kenya was a surprise entry into the Super Six after being gifted four points by New Zealand in the first round and staging a surprise 52-run victory over Sri Lanka.

The Kiwis had forfeited their game by refusing to play in Nairobi, citing terrorism fears.

The critics "have been talking about us getting the four points from New Zealand.

"But they are forgetting that we had to win three games to get to the Super Sixes. So you know it is painful to hear those kind of remarks. But again we are trying and hopefully we will shut our critics (up)," Tikolo said.

After posting a challenging total of 225, Kenya, which does not yet have Test status with the International Cricket Council, had the Indians with their backs to the wall, sending their top three batsmen - Virender Sehwag, Sachin Tendulkar and Mohammad Kaif - back to the dressing room by the 10th over for 24 runs.

"The boys have worked very hard toward achieving this goal of playing in the World Cup. And today's performance was excellent," said Tikolo.

Indian captain Sourav Ganguly also acknowledged that Kenya deserves more attention.

"Definitely ... I don't think (today's performance) was a flash in the pan. They beat Sri Lanka and they gave us a tough time today. We were in the dumps and we needed to play well to pull through," he said.

Ganguly said recognition for Kenyan cricket will come slowly although it was too early to judge whether it deserves the Test status.

Talking about the Indian performance, Ganguly said he was very impressed with the performance of Yuvraj Singh, who made an unbeaten 54 and was involved in an unbroken, match-winning 118-run fifth wicket with him. "I'm very happy for him because all of us in the team had a lot of faith in him. He had to go through a lot of tough times off the field for various reasons but today he proved he is a match winner. He has won us games from nowhere. He's got a great future ahead of him."

The Indian skipper also said that he didn't feel last weekend's game against Pakistan had any effect on his team. "We had six days after the game so we had enough time to recover. Whatever mental stress we had, six days were enough to get over it. I thought we were not up for this game this morning. We need to put up a much better performance if we are to get to the latter stages of the tournament," he said.

As for his 21st one-day hundred, the Indian skipper admitted it gave him lots of pleasure. "It was a satisfying hundred. It wasn't against the strongest side but we were definitely under pressure at 24 for three. They bowled pretty well then. Pressure makes a huge difference and I thought I did well to get a hundred,"Ganguly observed.