Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) captain Faf du Plessis reviewed his team’s IPL 2023 performance after they lost to Gujarat Titans (GT) in the final league match and were knocked out of the playoffs race.
Shubman Gill’s 104* triumphed over Virat Kohli’s 101* as he led GT’s charge in the chase of 198-run target and took his team home by 6 wickets.
Skipper Faf du Plessis said that the Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) weren't one of the best teams in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2023 and hence, they didn't deserve to be in the playoffs.
RCB's defeat meant that Mumbai Indians became the fourth team after the Titans, Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) to make their way into the playoffs.
"It is difficult as we had high hopes for the last game. We knew that we were playing a strong team tonight. After the momentum of the last two games, we were really looking forward to running into the playoffs with some good form behind us. Coming into a game against a top side like GT, you have to be on top of your own game," Du Plessis said in a video shared by RCB Twitter.
However, the South African was full of praise for young Shubman Gill and also mentioned that the team had some brilliant individual performances throughout the season, but failed to perform as a unit.
"We weren't far off. Shubman Gill played an unbelievable knock to get a hundred. It is disappointing that our season ended here, but we had some real positives in the form of Maxi this year. Virat was incredible. The partnerships between me and Virat were incredible and that consistency was remarkable," he stated.
"Siraj had a great campaign. There were also areas where we were consistently not great. If we look at ourselves, we will be honest in saying that we weren't one of the best teams in the competition. We were lucky that there were some really good performances throughout, but as a whole, we don't deserve to be in the playoffs. We tried hard tonight but fell short," du Plessis added.
