IND vs UAE | ‘I think this is a learning process for us’, UAE coach Lalchand Rajput looks at positives

‌United Arab Emirates had a far from ideal start to their Asia Cup T20 2025 campaign after being humiliated by India by nine wickets in Dubai. Coach Lalchand Rajput agreed that nerves got the better of his inexperienced side and they were owerawed by the occasion and the opponents.

The Gulf nation started well reaching 25/0 in the first three overs and were placed at a decent looking 41/2 at the end of powerplay before things quickly went south. Left-arm wrist spinner Kuldeep Yadav picked up four wickets, three of them in the ninth over, while medium pacer Shivam Dube also got three.

The UAE innings unravelled as they lost their last eight wickets in just 31 balls to be bowled out for 57. There was no looking back as the Indian openers toyed with the UAE’s bowling attack to finish the game inside five overs.

"To be very honest, it wasn't a turning track," Rajput said. "It was a good wicket to bat on, but the skill level these bowlers have got, and especially the wrist spinners, they will always turn on any type of wickets. And the way they were bowling and the length that they were bowling."

"For our batsmen, to be very honest, they were playing [against this quality of spin] for the first time," Rajput added. "They were overawed by India's big names. We should have batted 20 overs."

But the 2007 T20 World Cup winning coach was quick to take out the positives from an important match for the UAE. He reiterated that the team will get to learn a lot while turning up against a champion side like India.

He was also quick to rule out queries surrounding his team’s tactical acumen against the spin bowlers. He pointed out that the UAE had played spin very well in the recently concluded tri-series, which also involved Pakistan and Afghanistan, ahead of the Asia Cup.

"See, this is a big platform for them," he said. "It's a learning process for our players as well. I'm sure these matches will give them a lot of confidence. We just have to move on from here."

"We hardly got out to the spinners," he said. "It was just one spinner that we got out and that was Abrar Ahmed [Pakistan legspinner] in the second game [he picked up 4 for 9]. But we really played well in the tri-series. So yes, I think as I said earlier, these spinners are rare because wrist spinners, like Varun Chakravarthy, even top players struggle against them."

Rajput also opined that it was too early to write his team off as they are an improved lot now. He also highlighted that this was the loest his team could go and there is only one way from here.

But still I feel that we are a much better team and you will see in the coming matches as well. The players have started believing in themselves and I'm sure we'll improve because from here we can't go low down. We are only going to go up."