Curse the Challengers

As their name gores, the Royal Challengers Bangalore royally challenged their opposition-Warriors by setting a target of 174 on the board and taking them till the last over ball of the match to secure a win. Speaking with the spirit of the game, a win is a win, no matter which team it is and at which stage it has been achieved. One need not come to the conclusion that the Warriors had their luck on their way which the Royal Challengers Bangalore were missing. The game consists of 20 overs and if at all a team can win, it can do it even in the 120^th legal delivery.

It absolutely makes no sense in bringing in some invisible luck factor into the game where both teams are equipped with 11 best players who are thought to be fit. However, it is such games that keep the minds of a fan swinging like a pendulum. At one moment, the situation would be as though RCB would win and in another moment, Warriors would have made the equation theirs. Whatever may be the case, one thing that was seen in the game was the true spirit which usually lacks in a T20 game. There was a series of 20s and 30s from RCB with some hiccups.

A total of 172 is indeed a decent one. And, the reason for that were the five batsmen as mentioned who scored in 20s and 30s. Asking something more from RCB batsmen would not be fair. If not for Mayank Agarwal, the rest of them never deceived. But, if the scorecard of the Warriors is considered, there were only two batsmen in Ashwell Prince and Johan Botha who scored 74 and 42 respectively. If these two scores are removed from the Warriors' squad, the total reduces to 57 runs from 41 balls that included 5 wides as well. The Warriors no doubt lacked team work to a great extent.

By now, readers would have gone sick with me always highlighting about the lack of experimenting with the bowling. But still it is worth mentioning that Smuts was underrated when Tsotsobe was allowed to bowl 10 overs despite going in for 31 runs from 3 overs at over 10.00 runs an over. There was a splendid performance in the bowling department with Rusty Theron bowled a magnificent spell of 3-0-29-4 which stood apart from all major performances with the bat. In my opinion, Theron should have been given the man of the match and not Ashwell Prince when batting was not at all tough.