After his side’s loss against Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in their Indian Premier League (IPL) match, Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) skipper Faf Du Plessis said the wicket was at two pace in the first innings, leaving players had some difficulty with their percussion. With a scintillating batting display, Kolkata Knight Riders became the first team to win away from home in this IPL after their comprehensive seven-wicket win over Royal Challengers Bengaluru at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium on Friday.
Speaking at the post-match presentation, Faf said: “In the first innings we thought the wicket was very two-paced, you could see when the boys bowled the cutters at distance the boys really struggled. We thought it was quite a score, knowing that it gets a little easier in the evening, a little bit of dew came in. Looking at the way we batted in the first inning, even if you have someone in there, Virat I was struggling to get the ball just because there was a lack of pace and the surface had two paces.”
On whether the team could have done different things in powerplay with the ball, the skipper said: “You can always know after the match. We can say maybe try one or two things, but the way the two (Sunil Narine and Phil Salt”) hit the ball, there were really good batting, they put pressure on our bowlers. They hit strong cricket shots and took it game pretty much gone. With Narine there you can’t start turning, you want to use the pace up front. That’s a really good match for Salt too and the way he plays. They were excellent and really broke the game in the first six overs .”
Faf said the team tried to get spin options with all-rounder Glenn Maxwell, but there was not much spin in the surface game.
“We tried the spin options with Maxi, the finger spinners seem to be effective here, but there wasn’t too much spin at night,” he said.
Talking about medium pacer Vijaykumar Vyshak, Faf said he bowled well but hasn’t had many chances for RCB.
“We looked in the first innings and we thought about bringing in Karn Sharma (the spinner). But we felt that someone who could bowl really good slower balls was probably the toughest bowler to come across on this pitch. Dre Russ probably bowled 80 percent of his balls as cutters. We learned some lessons from that and he was the best bowler of the night,” he concluded.
After KKR won the toss, they opted to field. After losing skipper Faf early, Virat Kohli had a 65-run partnership with Cameron Green (33 in 21 balls, with four boundaries and two sixes) and a 42-run stand with Glenn Maxwell (28 in 19 balls, with three fours and a six). Virat scored 83 not out in 59 balls, with four boundaries and four sixes to take RCB to 182/6 along with Dinesh Karthik (20* in eight balls, with three sixes) in their 20 overs.
Andre Russell (2/29) and Harshit Rana (2/39) were the choice of bowlers for KKR.
In the run chase, Phil Salt (30 in 20 balls, with two fours and two sixes) and Sunil Narine (47 in 22 balls, with two fours and five sixes) got KKR off to a fine start with a quick stand-in from 86 runs. 39 balls. After Vyshak and Mayank Dagar (1/23 each) dismissed the openers, Venkatesh Iyer (50* in 30 balls, with three fours and four sixes) and skipper Shreyas Iyer (39 in 24 balls, with two fours and two sixes) led the way. KKR to a seven-wicket win with 19 balls to go.
Sunil won ‘Player of the Match’ in his 500th match for his knock of 47 and one wicket.
RCB are sixth in the points table with one win and two losses. They only have two points. KKR are second with two wins in two matches and four points.
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