Gaikwad scored 7 off 3 balls before being dismissed in the very first over of the chase.
Chennai Super Kings (CSK) suffered their third successive defeat, losing to Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) by 43 runs in an IPL 2026 match played at Chinnaswamy Stadium on Sunday (April 5).
Sent in to bat, Devdutt Padikkal slammed 29-ball 50, while Philip Salt made 30-ball 46 to lay the foundation. Skipper Rajat Patidar (48* off 19 balls) and Tim David (70* off 25 balls) then hit some lusty blows, stitching 99 runs in 35 balls to propel RCB to a gigantic 250/3 in 20 overs.
In reply, CSK’s innings folded for 207 in 19.4 overs with Sarfaraz Khan (50) and Prashant Veer (43) contributing the most.
Jacob Duffy (2/58), Bhuvneshwar Kumar (3/41) Krunal Pandya (2/36), Abhinandan Singh (2/30) and Suyash Sharma (1/21) shared the wickets for RCB.
Speaking during the post-match presentation, CSK skipper Ruturaj Gaikwad took personal responsibility for the loss, noting that a better contribution from him at the top of the order might have changed the outcome.
Gaikwad scored 7 off 3 balls with one six before being dismissed by Duffy in the very first over of the chase.
"Well, even I was surprised, to be honest. Great fight by Sarfaraz, Prashant Veer, Jamie Overton, even to some extent Shivam Dube. So I think, maybe I would have, contributed more top of the order, you never know, we would have chased it down. So definitely it's on me today," Gaikwad said.
The captain admitted that missed chances, including a dropped catch of Virat Kohli (28 off 18) and a costly no-ball by Anshul Kamboj to Tim David, shifted the momentum.
“I think, Anshul almost got a wicket of him. Unfortunate to be illegal delivery, but yeah, after that, he just smacked all around the park and, as you rightly said, hats off to him,” Gaikwad stated.
“We would have had, as you rightly said, if we would have taken early chance of Virat Kohli, I think that was, I mean, maybe we would have had momentum to ourselves. But I think, we still had the game in our hands till the 13th, 14th over, and that's when the momentum really shifted,” he remarked.
CSK are now languishing at the bottom of the points table and need to pull up their socks immediately. The franchise has so far played without MS Dhoni and Dewald Brevis due to injuries, though both are expected to return soon.