At 72/1 after 5.4 overs, it was the Rajasthan Royals game, day in and day out, chasing 206 against Royal Challengers Bengaluru at M Chinnaswamy Stadium, on April 24 (Thursday). But from thereon, on an extremely batting-friendly surface, RCB’s bowling unit turned the game around its head, winning the clash by 11 runs.
In the aftermath of the win, RCB’s former skipper Virat Kohli insisted that the Chinnaswamy Stadium is still the best place to play cricket.
“Chinnaswamy Stadium is the best place to play cricket in the IPL, and the fans backed us during good and bad times. It is a special place and have lot of special memories,” Kohli said after the win against RR.
RCB lost the toss and were put into batting first at the venue, where they got themselves off to a steady start without losing a single wicket inside the powerplay. That went a long way in pushing them beyond the 200-run mark, a score that proved to be more than enough at the end.
“The first challenge here (at this venue) is to win toss and second half it becomes a bit of a advantage, we have been fighting hard to get a good score in the first few games, but the template today was for one guy to bat through and the rest of the batters can go attacking and today it really paid off,” he said.
In the end, it was a one-of-a-kind bowling display from Josh Hazlewood, with four wickets, removing an in-form Yashasvi Jaiswal (19-ball 49), Dhruv Jurel (34-ball 47), Shimron Hetmyer (8-ball 11) and Josh Hazlewood (0 off 1). So, how did Hazlewood do that?
“First of all was sticking to your strengths. Knew the hard length was tough to hit on this wicket, mixing it up with the odd yorker, the slower balls, and the order in which to bowl them was the way to go,” Hazlewood said.
“Opportunity to play the format, did not have the opportunity with Test cricket and then ODI cricket. First, it is Sydney Sixers, CSK, and now RCB, these are the three teams majorly and a bit for Australia as well. Taking information from different pieces and putting it all together,” he added.
It wasn’t just Hazlewood but also a crucial contribution from Krunal Pandya, with figures of 2/31 and 1/33 from Yash Dayal.
“One of the big keys for us is to get the information to the group as well. I love our bowling attack. I feel we have got every base covered, everyone has their days and we are doing well. The bounce is quite steep here throughout the whole tournament, getting that score was phenomenal. I feel that was well-above par and the guys did a really great job.”
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