Royal Challengers Bangalore opened their account on the points table with a nervy 3-wicket win over Kolkata Knight Riders in the final over of the match at DY Patil Sports Academy, Mumbai. In a thrilling low-scoring contest, Dinesh Karthik finished it off in style with a six followed by a four in Andre Russell’s over to put the RCB’s campaign back on track. It was not an ideal batting performance from the RCB unit in the 129-run chase but in the end, they managed to earn a win.
Here are the talking points from Royal Challengers Bangalore vs Kolkata Knight Riders match
Wanindu Hasaranga Justifies His Price Tag
RCB invested a whopping INR 10.75 crore to sign Sri Lanka spin master Wanindu Hasaranga in their squad ahead of the season. The leggie failed to create his magic in the opening match against Punjab Kings but he bounced back brilliantly against KKR with a four-wicket haul and became the proud owner of the Purple Cap. He picked crucial wickets of Shreyas Iyer, Sheldon Jackson, Sunil Narine and Tim Southee to break KKR’s back in the crucial contest. RCB will want him to continue his form in the tournament going forward.
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Harshal Patel Back to His Best
After an underwhelming start to this season, Harshal Patel didn’t take much time to return to his best with back-to-back maiden overs against KKR where he also claimed two crucial wickets of Sam Billings and Andre Russell. Patel was a bit expensive against Punjab Kings where he leaked 36 runs in four overs for just one wicket but he got his things right against KKR. The crucial wicket of Russell changed the momentum of the game in RCB’s favour and it was Faf du Plessis who backed Patel to put up a contest against the Windies power-hitter. Apart from his bowling prowess, he also displayed his batting talent with a couple of crucial boundaries in the penultimate over which took RCB closer in the game.
KKR Batters Struggle Against Short Balls
Two-time IPL champions had an off day with the bat as none of their batters failed to touch the 30-run mark in the innings. RCB made a statement by exploiting the KKR top-order vulnerability against the short balls. KKR’s Venkatesh Iyer, Ajinkya Rahane and Nitish Rana got dismissed on short balls which put the batting order under pressure quite early in the innings. Brendon McCullum and the team management need to sort this particular flaw soon going forward in the league.
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Brave Shreyas Iyer
Iyer impressed many with his captaincy on Wednesday as he led his troops from the front when they were defending a tricky target of 129. “Before getting in, I spoke with my boys and told them that this game is going to define our character and attitude on the field no matter we defend or not”, Iyer said at the post-match presentation and his players didn’t disappoint him. The KKR skipper made some smart bowling changes which keep KKR in the hunt throughout the match.
Impressive Umesh Yadav
The homecoming has helped Umesh Yadav to rejuvenate his white-ball career. After exploiting CSK’s batting unit in the opening match of the season, Yadav continued his great form with the ball in the clash against RCB too. The premium pacer got an early wicket of Anuj Rawat with a jaffa and he followed it with a massive scalp of Virat Kohli. The 34-year-old has been hitting tight disciplined length quite similar to Test cricket which has worked well in his favour.
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