“I’m worried about those who are worried about Abhishek’s form,” Suryakumar said with a laugh at a press conference. “Why are they so worried about Abhishek’s form? I’m thinking about the team playing against him, that he hasn’t scored yet. You all should have seen what happens when he scores.

“It happens [ducks];It’s a team sport and it lasts. The team currently has the following requirements: Radka (A man) should play with his own identity. So he’s trying to play. If it happens, fine, but if it doesn’t, we’ve got you covered.

“He covered for us last year, and now we’re going to cover for him.”

When asked if India could bring in Sanju Samson, Suryakumar said, “Should we play Sanju instead of Abhishek?” When told that Samson could bat at number three, Suryakumar rolled his eyes theatrically.

“Does that mean we should let him play Tilak? We are doing well in the powerplay. We are still scoring 40-50 runs,” he said. “That’s normal cricket. We expect ourselves to score 220, 240, 250 runs. But the wickets are a little different here.

“The four wickets we have played so far have been a bit different and challenging. The off-spinners were not bowling before but they are bowling now. So we have started preparing for that and we hope to work on that as we start our Super Eights journey.”

Once the fun and banter had died down, Suryakumar went on to seriously explain the role of Tilak. He has played all innings at number three in the tournament so far and has a batting average of 120.45.

“I told him, team management told him he has to hit like that,” he said. “If one wicket is down, he can play his game in the powerplay. But as soon as two wickets are down, he has to take a bit of a backseat, get the partnership again and get to the 10th over. Then we have enough firepower to keep bowling and fight.”

“But I’m sure he’s not happy with his batting right now. He certainly is and he’s practiced a lot as well in the last couple of practices. But I don’t have any worries about him. He’s done very well for India as a No. 3 and I’m very confident he’ll get even better.”

Next came questions about the pressure and expectations of a home World Cup and how conversations in hotel lobbies ended with “the cup.” Raana Hai (Take it home.)

“It’s very difficult to say there’s no pressure or it’s manageable,” he said. “But, yeah, when you play such a big event in your home country, you definitely feel pressure. You meet a lot of people in hotels during your trip, so you can’t run away from the pressure. We all have the same goal. To win the World Cup, we have to perform well.”

“Yes, of course there is pressure. But at the same time, each individual has a plan to deal with it. It’s in your hands how you want to move it forward. But we’re doing our best to keep it simple.”

Therefore, India is trying to maintain the status quo and not drift too far, he said. The wobble in the early stages of the US game was a wake-up call for them. Since then, I’ve been taking it “one step at a time.”

So what about the law of averages? Achieved an undefeated record in the group stage. Is there a possibility that we will suddenly be looking for a victory in the remaining two games?

“We don’t think much about it,” he said. “We won so many games that it’s history. The more we stay in the present, the better the results will be.”