Kolkata (West Bengal) [India], April 7 : Royal Challengers Bangalore lost the battle with the bat as well as the ball against Kolkata Knight Riders on Thursday at Eden Gardens.
Even after leaking runs in the climax of the first innings, RCB had the potential in their batting order to chase down the target or at least get close to it. But KKR spinners laid a series of traps which made RCB's batting line-up look average. They ended up putting a score of 123 in 17.4 overs and lost the game by 81 runs.
"It was still a good wicket, our batting was very average and even when we lose games like these we need to ensure that we get close to the target, at least around 160 tonight. The game of T20 cricket moves so fast, we will try and learn our lessons, just making sure we tweak things we work on. It's fair to say tonight, it got a little bit away from us, tactically we could have been a little better. Death bowling is never the easiest jobs to do, Siraj and Harshal are quality bowlers at the death and just need to make sure, we work on our plans a little bit," RCB skipper Faf Du Plessis said after the match.
Shardul Thakur, a player who specializes in various bowling skills took the game away from RCB with his heroics from the bat. Rinku Singh held on to the other end and ensured a steady flow of runs with some of his unorthodox shots. Their 103-run partnership undid all the efforts of the RCB bowlers in the first 10 overs of the game.
"We had set it up nicely with the ball, probably at 100/5 around 13 overs, we kind of gave away 20-25 runs extra on that wicket. Shardul played incredibly well, he took the game away from us and KKR's leg-spinners bowled brilliantly. They got on top of us, with Narine and Chakaravarthy, they put the squeeze on us really well. Because that's the nature of leg spinners or mystery spinners," Faf Du Plessis continued.
After suffering their first defeat in the IPL 2023, RCB will be keen to regain their winning form against Lucknow Super Giants on Monday at M Chinnaswamy Stadium.
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