Slow wickets have been the highlight of the VIVO IPL 2021 tournament. On Matchday 6, when RCB faced off against SRH, the Chepauk track was probably one of the slowest ones the tournament had seen yet.
David Warner winning the toss and putting RCB into bat was a simple decision. Virat Kohli has always found starts but not has been at his fluent best in the VIVO IPL 2021. He opened with the recently negatively tested Padikkal who still looked lackluster. The slow wicket and tight lines from the SRH bowlers meant that RCB could never really engineer the push they wanted.
Padikkal scored a slow 11 off 13 balls, with 2 fours. Virat Kohli’s innings came to an end after the skipper scored 33 off 29 balls with 4 fours. It was only Maxwell that seemed to get a hold of the Chepauk track and measure up the SRH bowlers.
The Australian seems to be growing well in the tournament and reposing the faith that RCB has put in him. He seemed at ease scoring 59 off 41 balls with 3 sixes and 5 fours. None of the other RCB batsmen found any form in the middle and their event folded at 149.
In response, RCB got Wriddhiman Saha early on in the innings. Mohammad Siraj made the white ball talk in Chepauk and showed why he is India’s top fast bowling promise at the moment. However, David Warner and Manish Pandey steadied the ship and ensured that SRH tries to not repeat what KKR did the other night.
Warner scored his fifty and ultimately held out to Dan Christian off a Jamieson slower ball bouncer. The Australian stitched together a great knock of 54 off just 37 balls. His innings include just the one six and 7 fours. Manish Pandey continued to play the sheet-anchor role and went by a good run-a-ball figure.
Yet another sensational finish at The Chepauk as #RCB beat #SRH by 6 runs.
Scorecard – https://t.co/apVryOzIWv #SRHvRCB #VIVOIPL pic.twitter.com/G3cVkk4GJr
— IndianPremierLeague (@IPL) April 14, 2021
With SRH tantalizingly close to the target, Virat Kohli showed why he is one underrated captain. Bringing Shahbaz Ahmed, a left-arm off-spinner into the attack with the hope that across-the-line slog would result in some wickets. Ahmed delivered with wickets of Pandey, Bairstow, and Samad in just one over.
Scenes from KKR’s last night defeat came into public memory once again. SRH seemed to self-implode just like KKR did the other night. SRH was allowing the pressure to get to them. With zero run-scoring shots and a dreadful Chepauk pitch, the seemingly low score set by RCB started looking like a huge one.
Vijay Shankar and Jason Holder, two senior batsmen held out at deep midwicket and long on respectively. Rashid Khan showed sparks with a first-ball six off Siraj. With 17 runs needed off the last over, RCB was solidly in control of the game. Rashid Khan tried to pull it off for SRH but it was all too little too late. RCB winning the game by 7 runs.
