Virat Kohli was a happy man at the post match presentation, as RCB has absolutely thrashed KXIP, winning the game by 10 wickets, in what turned out to be a rather one-sided game.
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With so many star batsmen on display today, it seemed like the crowd would be treated to a high-scoring encounter, but the RCB bowlers had other ideas, especially Umesh Yadav, who just ran through that KXIP top order.
And once KL Rahul and Chris Gayle were dismissed, it was always going to be an uphill task for the KXIP side, as Gayle and Rahul had scored 55% of the total KXIP runs this season.
With just 88 on the board, it always felt like RCB would go all out to provide a boost to their net run-rate and that is exactly what Kohli did, as he promoted himself up the order to lead the chase.
Kohli and Parthiv put on an exhibition in the powerplay, tonking the bowlers to all parts of the ground and finishing off the game in just 8.1 overs.
Kohli termed the game as the ‘perfect match’ as the RCB unit did not put a foot wrong. He emphasised on the fact that how they tried to put pressure on the KXIP batsmen, knowing that they’ll have to put a good score on the board in the absence of their ‘mystery spinner’.
“Couldn’t have asked for a more clinical performance. No negatives to point out today. Perfect game for us. (On RCB’s new ball spell) Kings XI thought that we would be intimidated by their openers on this small field but the way our bowlers started and took the batsmen out, they knew that they couldn’t make any mistakes. Umesh was brilliant, taking those two big wickets in the same over.
“We kept picking wickets throughout and that was crucial. (On the toss factor) Very important because that’s been the trend at this ground and we knew that they will try extra with their mystery spinner not playing. We knew we could bank on that factor. They were trying to get 30 extra due to that. The big shot kept coming and we kept taking wickets.” Kohli said.
On the road ahead and the playoff scenario, Kohli was pretty confident of his team’s chances. The mood in the RCB camp is just about right as they are playing like a team that doesn’t have much to lose.
“We fancy chasing down big totals and we like to intimidate the opposition like that. One big partnership usually does the trick in T20s and the way me and AB bat, the opposition know what can happen.
“We want to take responsibility as batsmen, the toss may not go well every time. One is at home and we have the right momentum. (On the road ahead) We are in the nothing-to-lose zone and it will work well for us.
“Other teams will be wary of a team with such mindset. We aren’t going to get too ahead of ourselves. The last game will be interesting if we can get the next one. We still got three days till the next game, we just want to enjoy the break till then.” Kohli concluded
