IPL 2021 | RCB vs KKR - What Experts Said as RCB coast to a convincing victory

Royal Challengers Bangalore continued their winning juggernaut in Vivo IPL 2021 as they won their third straight match of the competition beating Kolkata Knight Riders in the 10th match of the tournament by 36 runs. It was a brilliant all-round show by RCB right from the toss when Virat Kohli didn’t have any hesitations batting first after winning the toss. 

The target of 205 was always going to be a huge ask for the Kolkata Knight Riders. They needed a flying start and that was provided by Shubman Gill. He literally smashed his way to 21 before pershing in an attempt to find the boundary once again. Rahul Tripathi began with a boundary as KKR raced off to 27/1 in the first two overs. 

However, the tides turned as the RCB bowlers stormed their way back into the game by delivering some exceptional middle overs. Yuzvendra Chahal got some good purchase from the surface and the KKR middle order was found out. Nitish Rana who came into the crease on the back of consecutive half-centuries had to depart in an attempt to keep in pace with the required rate. 

Dinesh Karthik also departed early and it seemed a huge task ahead of Eoin Morgan and Shakib Al Hasan. The ball was not coming onto the bat and batting became more and more difficult. Glenn maxwell’s introduction in the attack saw Morgan taking him apart for three sixes in two overs. 

However, the medium pacers which included the Hero of the match from the opening encounter, Harshal Patel continued their good work and it became an almost impossible job from thereon. 

Andre Russell came onto the crease and gave a few glimpses of his old self but the target proved to be way too big in the end. Russell’s refusal of singles in the penultimate over to Harbhajan Singh who can hit the long ball could be questioned and his fitness levels still look below-par. 

Earlier in the day RCB skipper, Virat Kohli won the toss and had no hesitations to bat first given the history of the ground in this tournament so far. Eoin Morgan missed a trick early by not giving an extra over to Chakravarthy against Maxwell when he was going through a dream spell. He had bamboozled Kohli and Patidar in his very first over to put RCB on the backfoot. 

With RCB being pushed to the corner, Maxwell and Devdutt Padikkal resurrected the innings. While Padikkal could never get going and found stroke-making very difficult, Maxwell went along his merry way and smashed the KKR bowlers all around the MA Chidambaram Stadium. 

He looked like batting in a completely different pitch to what Padikkal was batting. Eventually, Padikkal’s dismissal actually worked in favour of RCB as it brought AB de Villiers in the crease. Like so many times AB de Villiers yet again showed why he is regarded as one of the finest batsmen of all time. 

If Maxwell made batting look ridiculously easy, ABD took it to a whole new level. On a pitch where stroke-making has never been easy, ABD literally toyed with the KKR bowlers and blazed his way to a knock of 76 of 34 deliveries which were studded with 9 fours and 3 sixes. His magical knock took RCB over the 200 mark and it eventually proved way too much. 

Captain’s Viewpoints 

Kolkata Knight Riders skipper Eoin Morgan felt that the day totally belonged to the RCB batsmen as a score of 204 was always going to be a tall task to chase down especially on a Chennai surface. He also backed his decision to not give Chakravarthy that extra over when he had picked two wickets in his first over. 

"Certainly RCB's day with the bat on a rocket-hot afternoon game. It [The Chennai pitch] certainly has stumped me, and I can't gauge the wicket. Everyone who batted on this wicket felt it played better but RCB played better." Morgan said.

When asked if he could have given that extra over to Chakravarthy, Morgan said, “Probably not to be honest. Maxwell is a fine player, but to bowl, to AB you need to have that [option]. Yeah, yeah, we struggled to kick on and got us into a position where only Andre could do it. Different wicket [in Mumbai], dew, and we have been watching those games.”

Meanwhile, RCB skipper Virat Kohli lauded his bowlers for a sensational effort. He reserved praise for Mohammed Siraj who bowled a magnificent penultimate over giving away just a single. He bowled the yorkers to perfection and Rusell didn’t manage to get under it on any occasion. 

“Especially Siraj's over to Russell [was good] - he has had some history against Russell. He's a different bowler after the Australia tour and he shut the game out. Harshal has so much clarity in the end and I think Jamieson also bowled well. That's the reason why we have three out of three,” Kohli said. 

"To be fair, on a pitch like Chennai, you probably have a bit more space to make an error on the longer boundary. It has to be on the offside and not on side. Siraj did miss on the full-toss, but he has two men on the boundary. The execution was spot-on." Kohli further added.

Kohli felt that the pitch was not that easy to bat on and that it was just the sheer brilliance of Maxwell and ABD which got them over the 200 mark. 

“We played in Wankhede, Kolkata and Ahmedabad where the margin of error keeps getting smaller. Well, I said at the halfway mark we have 200 because of two genius innings back-to-back. Maxwell was outstanding and AB to follow. When he gets in with that kind of form and flow, it's impossible to stop him. We got 40 extra runs on that pitch which slowed down. Maxi has taken to this team like duck to water. AB loves the team and they were the difference today. There are areas we can work on. We're not getting ahead of ourselves and not getting over-excited,” Kohli added. 

Expert’s Opinion 

A popular face in world cricket, Harsha Bhogle felt that South Africa have to find a way to include AB de Villiers in the national squad for the T20 World Cup slated to be played in India later this year. 

Bhogle on the other hand criticised KKR's bowling approach after the Morgan-led side failed to use their resources well and were forced to bowl Harbhajan Singh in the penultimate over.

Referring to Maxwell's breezy knock, Harsha Bhogle gave a witty reply to Housing. com saying that Maxwell has finally found his home in Bangalore. 

Renowned journalist Sambit Bal also lauded the likes of Glenn Maxwell and AB de Villiers for making batting look ridiculously easy during the middle and the death overs. 

Meanwhile, when Chakravarthy bagged the wicket of Virat Kohli and Rajat Patidar in his opening over, Bal said that it will be sweeter for Chakravarthy after not getting his opportunity in the national colours owing to his failure in the yo-yo test. 

Ayaz Menon lauded Mohammed Siraj for bowling an incredible penultimate over and had a special mention for ABD whose knock actually proved to be the difference between the two teams. Both teams were going on at the same rate but it was ABD’s heroics in the final few overs which resulted in RCB going past the 200-mark. 

Trying to make sense of Yuzvendra Chahal's exceptional bowling on the night where he picked two crucial wickets of Nitish Rana and Dinesh Karthik, Cricviz pointed out how successfully Chahal had used his variations on the night.

Scribe Ben Jones predicted like many others that there was no way that ABD would be dropped from the SA national team who are scheduled to play the T20 WC in subcontinental conditions.

KKR and Eoin Morgan after their loss tonight will surely be pondering if they are going to play their next match, scheduled to be hosted in Wankhede with the same combination. With all four overseas players having a torrid game against the RCB, KKR might look at aggressive changes for the next game. It is of high probability that in a small ground that has not aided much spin, Shakib Al Hasan finds his way out of the XI and Andre Russell is benched for the likes of Lockie Ferguson. KKR also have the option of getting in players like Tim Seifert who will act as a better batting cover for a team that have clearly been losing the plot in the middle overs.

With their next game scheduled on 21 April, one can predict that if KKR do not fix their multitude of issues quickly, they might be looking at an early exit in the tournament.