Back from the brink of elimination with a five-match winning streak, the Royal Challengers Bengaluru have battled admirably to stay alive in the IPL 2024 playoffs race, heading into their final league game at home against the Chennai Super Kings.
With both teams clashing in a virtual knockout for a last-four spot, the fierce rivalry coupled with the potential last dance of the MS Dhoni-Virat Kohli meeting will take the hype.
But how exactly have RCB managed five consecutive wins—the only team to achieve the feat thus far this season? Incidentally, in all three previous instances where RCB registered as many successive wins (2009, 2011, and 2016), they had entered the final.
In hindsight, things would have been surprisingly smoother for Bengaluru if they had managed to scrape past the Kolkata Knight Riders at the Eden Gardens, where they fell short by a solitary run last month. However, Faf du Plessis and Co. have ticked most boxes in the next four weeks.
While their head-to-head tussle with CSK does not hold in their favour, the facets of RCB’s recent uptick could hand them the upper hand over their nemesis, who has struggled to hold their identity this edition.
The comeback
Having used up 22 of their 25 players by April, RCB finally got their act together in terms of their core playing XI balance and resources since the KKR defeat. In the five matches since, they have only used 15 players, with Glenn Maxwell, Lockie Ferguson, Mahipal Lomror, and Vijaykumar Vyshak being swapped around besides the regular eleven.
The team has seen a tremendous improvement in their batting across phases, with the PowerPlay commanding stability from the trio of Virat Kohli, Faf du Plessis, and Will Jacks, who have not allowed more than two wickets to fall in the phase in the last five matches. 333 of RCB’s 784 Powerplay runs have come in the last five outings, with the strike rate and boundary-scoring rate witnessing a positive movement.
While Kohli has led the phase with his refined methods, skipper du Plessis and Jacks have chipped in simultaneously, helping the team to starts of 61/1, 63/1, 92/1, 56/2, and 61/2. This streak has placed RCB fourth-best among all teams in the Powerplay this year, both in terms of runs scored and run rate. At the same time, the Super Kings have struggled to rise to the manic scoring rates in the Powerplay, going at only 8.65 rpo in 13 matches.
The Patidar factor
Meanwhile, RCB have waltzed to the top of the middle-overs batting charts over the last month with a run-rate of 9.75, the best among all teams. Integral to this has been the Rajat Patidar blitzkrieg and Kohli’s surge in the phase.
Rajat Patidar after scoring a ton in IPL. (FILE)
While three of his earlier fifties in the league ended in defeats, Patidar cracked two aggressive half-centuries in the last two matches with the team in trouble. Batting first, the 30-year-old had entry points at 36/2 and 43/2 against the Delhi Capitals and Punjab Kings, respectively, but notched up scores of 52 (32) and 55 (23) to help RCB set up wins with big margins, helping their net run rate (NRR) in the process.
Although teams have radicalised the striking rates up front and at the death, it is evident from the scoring rates that the middle-overs have more or less remained in a similar plane from the preceding editions. With his return to form, Patidar has brutalised bowlers, particularly spin, in the middle overs, smashing a whopping 26 sixes from the 137 deliveries he has faced in between overs 7-16. Patidar’s bewildering strike rate of 186.86 is also the best among the 14 batters to have crossed 200 runs in the phase.
168 of Patidar’s total 256 runs in the middle-overs have come against the spinners, at an astounding 230.13 strike rate while reeling in 19 maximums.
RCB have also crawled up to the fourth spot among the quickest-scoring teams at the death, striking at 11.86 rpo. This has been fuelled by the big-bucks Cameron Green finally coming into his element at number five, chipping in with valuable cameos at the death in three of the five wins.
Bowling prudency
With the composition of its bowling resources, RCB were primed for a disastrous run this season, and so it did show in the first half. Until of course, the management rearranged its choice of spinners and overseas seamers.
The inclusion of Swapnil Singh has resulted in multiple positives for the side, with the left-arm spinner emerging as a surprise factor with the new ball, leading the charts among the tweakers with five Powerplay scalps.
Swapnil and an in-form Yash Dayal have sheathed the wavering returns of Mohammed Siraj while enabling du Plessis to utilise Lockie Ferguson in the middle-overs for better effect. With Green too chipping in with wickets, RCB have perhaps gathered enough momentum to overpower CSK at Chinnaswamy.
Mahendra Singh Dhoni Captain of Chennai Super Kings and Virat Kohli Captain of Royal Challengers Bangalore at the toss. (File)
RCB-CSK trivia
🔴 The CSK-RCB match-up is the most lopsided fixture in the IPL with the Super Kings winning 21 of their 31 meetings at a 2.090 win-loss ratio. RCB have lost five of their nine completed matches at home against the CSK.
🔴 Gearing up for their potential final face-off in a competitive game, Dhoni and Kohli have featured in 390 and 389 T20s respectively, thus far.
🔴 Dhoni has outperformed Kohli in RCB-CSK matches at the Chinnaswamy, scoring 413 runs at a 82.60 average as opposed to the latter’s 280 runs, averaging 35.00.
🔴 Dinesh Karthik could become the second Indian after Rohit Sharma to feature in 400 T20s.
