Durban, Jan 9:Indian captain MS Dhoni was happy with the way his side performed in their T20 outing against South Africa today. Dhoni believed that the presence of part-time spinners in the side gave the Indians a huge advantage coming into the game.

Excerpts from an interview:

Great occasion and good performance:

Well of course, indeed it was. After winning the toss what was needed was to put runs on the board. I think Rohit batted really well, gave us the kind of start that was needed but as the ball got older later on in the innings it became slightly difficult to score and one of the main reasons being we lost wickets at regular interval and all our big-hitters you know were not really able to score big. I think at the end of the day, 160-170 odd runs on this kind of wicket was a very good score to defend.

And you would have thought you got plenty of bowling options, spinners in the side from whom you can choose from and even though South Africa were going well at one stage

That’s a very big advantage that we have got in a way. We have got plenty of part-timers who have got the experience of bowling in IPL. They are specialist bowlers when it comes to the T20 format and the wicket also was quite you can say in favour of them. If it is short of length the ball generally bounces but over here it was completely different so the spinners took more advantage of that more than the fast bowlers

What was the experience like playing in this magnificent stadium?

Well of course it’s good. Playing football would have been better because it’s a specialist field designed for soccer which means it has more sand content compared to the normal stadium and for cricket they had to cut the grass which means the out-field was very very soft and it was a bit demanding for the out-fielder. But still the kind of match it was, I think it was really great to be part of it and the atmosphere, the crowd support for both the teams was there. So eventually it was a very good evening to play cricket.