Royal Challengers Bengaluru vs Sunrisers Hyderabad: The Truth Behind SRH’s 201

The match Between RCB and SRH appeared to be close on the scoreboard, but on the field, the game was not close at all. On March 28 at M. Chinnaswamy Stadium, SRH posted 201/9 in their innings, but RCB chased down the total in just 15.4 overs and won the match by 6 wickets with 26 balls to spare.

This first shock of the season was causing some to raise their eyebrows. Scoring over 200 at Chinnaswamy should be enough for the chasing team to question whether they can successfully chase such a target. The RCB never wavered. They maintained an aggressive approach from the first ball of their innings, were almost always ahead of the run rate throughout the innings, and very quickly turned a sizeable target into a sprint.

The SRH did get a great innings from their stand-in captain, Ishan Kishan, who scored 80 runs off of 38 balls, and received assistance from Heinrich Klaasen with 31 runs off 22 balls, and Aniket Verma with 43 runs off of 18 balls; which allowed SRH to get past 200 runs. There was, however, desolation beneath these numbers: SRH’s batting line-up had lost 3 wickets for 29 runs in just 4.2 overs, so the early inning damage to their chances of winning left their chances of winning very small.

So how do you lose after scoring 201 runs in Bengaluru? No one mistake. A combination of multiple mistakes: early in the game an ineffective power play, having to repair the innings from the early damage, 2 momentum killing catches from Phil Salt, and an ineffective bowling performance that showed no growth in terms of control.

The route to 201

The raw total of 202 gave the SRH an impression of a strong performance, however, the route taken to score such an impressive total paints a different picture. uffy dismissed three members of the Sunrisers’ top-order during the Powerplay to disrupt their chances of settling in before trying to rectify the poor start they had been given. Duffy ultimately dismissed Travis Head for 11 runs, Abhishek Sharma for 7 runs and Nitish Kumar Reddy for just 1 run. The result was a match-winning performance for Duffy, who ended up with bowling figures of 3/22 and gave the RCB team a great start to the match.

None of this is reflected on the scoreboard. The way in which SRH are constructed to play is to smash the ball, and then figure it out as they go along. Both Head and Abhishek did this for the most part, so with only five overs having been bowled when they both got out, the SRH batting lineup really lost its sense of self.

The understanding that they had created a game-saving partnership (97 from 53 overs) between Ishan Kishan and Heinrich Klaasen meant that SRH were back from the edge of disaster. And although it helped to give some teeth back to the innings, it was more of a total recovery than a dominant result.

Although SRH were able to recover after losing three wickets at 29 runs, their final total of 201 would not scare any team.

Kishan and the recovery

Kishan should get a considerable amount of credit for his innings as well as for being the acting captain for SRH in his first match. He played like a man possessed and as if he wanted to take the innings upon himself.Hit 8 fours and 5 sixes, ran over 210 and kept the SRH from going belly-up after the top 4 had rendered the innings unrecognizable.

When partnered with KL Rahul, it became clear this partnership would begin giving the SRH their much-needed turn from looking like a lost cause to becoming a match-winning entity. Rahul came out swinging while Kishan continued the scoreway/go almighty. The bowlers of RCB, after the last wicket was taken, had to scramble for answers through the middle. For a brief time, it seemed as if 29/3 could be turned into something completely ridiculous by SRH.

Then there were a couple of moments that solidified the final score.

Salt from the boundary

The 2 catches Phil Sutherland made from the boundary line that ultimately resulted in the dismissals of Rahul and Kishan were like a door slamming on SRH’s chance of establishing a late charge to victory. Rahul’s important performance of 31 allowed Kishan to expand on the innings to a real possibility of having a chance after his impressive contribution of 80 with the bat in hand to have a last push. The other wicket of Kishan at 80 eliminated the opportunity for a furious last 4 overs that would have placed them out of reach for what was a very solid innings at the halfway point.

An awesome 43 runs with 18 balls from Aniket Verma was the final icing on the cake, but it also enabled their innings total to reach 201/9. RCB’s Romario Shepherd also picked up 3 wickets during the final overs of the innings and therefore prevented further runs from being scored in any real hopes of getting their score to an amount that would have qualified SRH for a winning total. While the final 5 overs of the innings showed they had a lot of potential, it ultimately proved to be too little because there was already something way too devastating done in the first 4 innings.

In conclusion, Kishan helped give the SRH an opportunity; he just was not given a properly laid-out foundation that would enable him to produce 80 runs that could provide his team with a winning total.

Salt’s match-refining moments

Salt’s match-refining moments won’t show up in the box score but will still be a big story: the great innings played by Rahul and Padikkal and the unfortunate last wicket of Duffy at the end of the match, which all will still be discussed in the next couple of hours by almost everyone who was in attendance at this game.The boundary fielding of Salt should be specifically mentioned in this review.

Typically boundary fielding is considered minor in the T20 analysis however on this night it played an integral part in the outcome of the match. By catching the two biggest threats to the SRH from winning the match (as they are the two biggest threats to the RCB winning against the SRH) with the two wickets taken by Salt, the wickets became instrumental.

With Salt’s wicket of Kishan, taken by a catch from Salt it turned out to be a direct contribution to the eventual total of 201. If Kishan’s wicket had not been taken by Salt, he could have added further runs to the total as he had already found a way to score runs against the pitch. Therefore, it changes the emotional value of 201. While 201 looks like a strong total, it lacked the punch to cause a RCB to be able to win at the Chinnaswithy stadium.

Adding to the larger picture of the result, the way that Salt contributed to all three disciplines of the game is an excellent way to describe the overall win for the RCB. By taking the new ball, Duffy put the RCB in a commanding position; By taking the catches of both the SRH’s Kishan and Bairstow allows for the RCB to continue chasing down the SRH; By continuing to score runs throughout his innings, Kohli and Padikkal both made sure that there was no scoreboard pressure, and the scoreboard pressure would be on both the SRH and the RCB. The RCB created multiple chances to win the T20 match through dominating each of the phases of the match.

Why the SRH bowlers failed

RCB had already scored 76 runs for 1 wicket after six overs; Padikkal scored 61 from 26 balls; Kohli went 69 from 38 balls; Together they put on a 101-run partnership in only 45 balls; and after Padikkal was dismissed in the ninth over, the RCB needed only 92 runs to win with 68 balls to play; therefore, there were no pressures on the scoreboard for the RCB. When Rajat Patidar entered the match, it was clear that SRH would not be able to regain control of the game. His 31 runs from 12 balls put the chase completely out of reach for the opposition and capped off his and Virat Kohli’s 53 runs partnership (in just 22 balls). There was absolutely no way that SRH would have an opportunity to reset.

SRH’s problems were much larger than one bad over, however. SRH failed to ever create pressure on the batter, with there being no prolonged periods of dot balls, no pressure being mounted by squeezing the batters through the middle, and no opportunity at all for players like Kohli to slow the game down and reevaluate their game plan. Over the course of 15.4 overs, they gave up almost 13 runs an over. This stat tells everything you need to know about how much control they had (or did not have) on the innings as a whole.

Padikkal was also a key factor in the progression of the innings for SRH as he allowed Kohli to have a very good understanding of how to measure the chase, when to be aggressive, and to remain not out due to Padikkal effectively eliminating any opportunity to manage the asking rate early by hitting the ball so well. By a left-handed batsman being able to hit the ball so well early in the innings at Chinnaswamy Stadium, field placements change quickly in order to account for the hitting ability of the batter. Length will be a dangerous option for bowlers and width will disappear from the field of play, and bowlers will now focus on trying to find alternative solutions, rather than dictating terms.

Kohli made the target smaller

As is often the case when Kohli is chasing a target, he made the target feel smaller and smaller with every over. He had no panic, there were no unnecessary wasteful balls that created drama just for the sake of creating drama, he had a very controlled approach to getting to fifty, and the finish was the same.The type of innings that breaks down the minds of bowling attacks is what I would refer to as the “scoreboard lies” phenomenon; T20 matches are won based on how teams built their respective totals, and how the team chasing started the innings.

The Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) gave away the powerplay quite badly, repaired the innings very well, then dropped two batsmen in the wrong situations, and then allowed Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) to score 76 runs in the first six overs of their innings. When viewing the game through these phases of play, the eventual outcome will not seem surprising, but rather will seem like it was unavoidable.

This is why the margin of six wickets hurts. In a normal chase, teams will lose six wickets. However, to lose six wickets with 26 balls left, in an innings in which they were defending a total of 201 runs, is something entirely different; it shows that the total they were chasing was never the determining factor in the chase, rather it was RCB dictating the chase to them.

Furthermore, based on the surface conditions prior to the match, and the T20 batting total predictions of close to 190 in the first innings, there was a distinct expectation that there would be an advantage for teams batting second in the event of the presence of dew in the second innings. Thus, once SRH reached 29/3, they were faced with either an unlikely romantic ending or an outstanding bowling performance to win the game – neither of these occurred.

The only issue SRH should be concerned with is that when they review the final total of 201, many will wonder how this was not sufficient to win the match; the question that should actually concern SRH is “how did they allow RCB to make their chase so easy?”

Numbers that will stick

Here are some numbers that will stick in SRH’s minds.

To wrap up from Bengaluru

To wrap up from Bengaluru – what the SRH achieved on Saturday night was something that is difficult to achieve; to come back from 29/3 to reach a score of 200+. Most grounds, SRH would have been in a position to win; however, at the Chinnaswamy Stadium on this pitch against this version of RCB, they did not get the reward of having a solid total, they received a marginal loss.

RCB were the most dominant team in every phase of play – throughout the powerplay (first six overs); hitting boundaries; in close to completing their chase calmly; and when the opportunity presented itself to pile on runs once the chase was completed. Therefore, this result will haunt SRH’s players as they did not lose the match to one brilliant batting performance; they lost to a team that was superior in every phase of play.

After Saturday’s match, when SRH takes to the field for its next match, there will be two areas from Saturday night’s match that SRH must address prior to its next match; the first six overs of the batting innings for SRH, and the first six overs in the bowling innings for SRH. If SRH can resolve these areas, then 200 runs are a winning score; otherwise even a total of 201 runs will be considered light at best.