Royal Challengers Bangalore skipper, Virat Kohli, has said that his team’s humiliating 111-run loss at the hands of Kings XI Punjab has come at just the right time.
Kohli, who is leading the side in place of injured regular skipper, Daniel Vettori, reckons that the defeat will work as a wake-up call for the players just before the play-offs.
RCB’s seven-match winning streak broke as the Punjab outfit thrashed them in the 63rd Indian Premier League clash on Tuesday, May 17, 2011.
After electing to bat first, the Kings posted a mighty total of 232 runs in the given overs. The skipper, Adam Gilchrist, hammered the Bangalore bowling attack and smashed a thrilling knock of 106 runs from just 55 balls. Shaun Marsh also gave full support to his captain and hit a brilliant unbeaten 79.
Later in the match, Bangalore’s star-stuttered batting line-up collapsed on a paltry 121. The in-form West Indian, Chris Gayle, got out on a duck while no other batsman could manage to contribute anything notable.
Kohli, who lost his wicket after scoring just 11 runs, believes that the timing of the loss is perfect as it will give Royal Challengers time to rethink their strategy.
"It`s a good reality check, we needed something like this to re-group, see our faults and correct them going forward. You cannot go and win every time. Good that it has happened before the semi-finals," Kohli said.
The classy right-hander further gave full credit to Gilchrist and Marsh who snatched the game away from them. Admitting the fact that the Bangalore bowlers did not bowl well, Kohli made clear that the brutal batting from Gilchrist and Marsh left them with no chance to come back into the game.
"We didn`t bowl well but all the shots they hit were clean shots, so we couldn`t do much about that. I thought we could restrict them to 160 after the first six overs but after that the next five overs I don`t think we bowled very well. They also batted brilliantly, hats off to them," he added.
Meanwhile, Kohli urged his teammates to learn a lesson from the game and come up with an improved performance in the upcoming games.
0 comments:
Post a Comment