Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) Director of Cricket Mike Hesson has blamed the poor execution with the ball for the team’s massive eight-wicket loss to the Chennai Super Kings in the 44th game of the ongoing IPL 2020 at Dubai International Stadium on Sunday (October 25).
However, Hesson also said the RCB batsmen “failed to build up the intensity” and struggled to put the foot down against the CSK spinners but felt the target of 146 was defendable in Dubai.
On Sunday, RCB skipper Virat Kohli (50) and batsman AB de Villiers (39) added 82 runs with some great technique to take the franchise to 145/6 after the batting collapse against CSK.
Defending the total, Chris Morris and Yuzvendra Chahal could only manage to take one wicket each as Ruturaj Gaikwad and Ambati Rayudu chased down the 146 with 8 balls to spare on Sunday.
Hesson during the post-match presentation: “Well, I wouldn't say we felt comfortable with the score we had, I think we felt that we had a score we could defend if we bowled and fielded well, which we didn't, from a batting point of view, we failed to build up the intensity, fair play to CSK spinners, they bowled nicely and we struggled to put the foot down. With the ball, we failed to execute as well as we have done in the past matches this season. From the execution point of view, it was a bit disappointing.”
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He further added, “It was an off day, with the ball we have been pretty consistent throughout, I do not think we adapted that well to the conditions like we have done in this tournament, the ball swung around in Abu Dhabi in our match against KKR. Today, we were required to be patient, we just did not hit our length, credit goes to Gaikwad, he played nicely.”
On the decision to bat first, Hesson said: “We saw the game last night, we saw the ball turning, we knew that CSK were likely to play left-arm spinners, it was a double-edged sword, the decision to bat first was based on the conditions.”
He signed off by saying, “We saw throughout that it is a tough wicket to come out and start hitting from ball one, two best in the business batters like Kohli and de Villiers batted well, but it was difficult to put the foot down if the bowlers were bowling well on this wicket, it would have been far easier to hit the ball if we had set batsman at the crease.”
Noteworthy, RCB is currently in the third position in the points table with 14 points from 11 matches and will next take on Mumbai Indians on Wednesday, October 28 in Abu Dhabi.
(With ANI Inputs)
