Lucknow Supergiants were eliminated from IPL 2022 after losing the IPL eliminator to Royal Challengers Bangalore on Sunday. A reason for their loss could be KL Rahul who not only missed an easy chance of Dinesh Karthik, but he also batted poorly under pressure. The target for LSG was a mammoth 208 runs and LSG could have made a match of it had KL Rahul batted, well, at least a little faster.
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There was a phase when Rahul’s batting seemed a tad selfish and it felt as if he was happy as long as he got his 600 runs for the season. The skipper had a great start as he scored 26 runs off 17 balls during the field restrictions. However, the LSG skipper only managed to hit one boundary in the next seven overs, despite the required run rate climbing. Even former head coach Ravi Shastri criticised him.
“They should have gone a little earlier. Sometimes, you wait too long but here, between the 9th and the 14th over, they should have been someone who should have been targeted, especially in that partnership,” Ravi Shastri told Star Sports.
“When Hooda and Rahul were going, I think even though he did as well as he did, KL could have taken a little more chances because Hooda was going. Take a little more chances and he could have targeted someone between the 9th and the 13th over because Harshal was going to come back in the end. If they had got the required rate down at the stage, that would have made RCB a little nervous,” Shastri added.
Even as the skipper, Rahul failed to inspire his team as they went onto drop Patidar not once but thrice: at 59, 72 and 93. After a 40-minute delayed start due to bad weather, Lucknow got off to a superb start when Mohsin got RCB skipper Faf du Plessis for a golden duck in the first over.
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