Lucknow Super Giants captain KL Rahul said his team fell just “two big hits” short of winning the Indian Premier League 2022 Eliminator against Royal Challengers Bangalore on Wednesday.
Speaking at a press conference after LSG’s IPL 2022 campaign ended at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata, Rahul also rued the dropped catches from his team that eventually led to their 14-run defeat against RCB.
“It is hard to pinpoint one thing. Skills-wise, you can have a bad day and can go wrong with your execution with bat and ball. Something that has let us down badly in this game is our fielding. We dropped some easy catches,” said Rahul.
“I dropped DK (Dinesh Karthik) when he was batting, probably in single digits. (Rajat) Patidar was dropped when he was batting on 60 or 70. Dropping them cost us that extra 30-40 runs. We fought really hard and tried our best to chase down the target. But we were just two hits away and had we gotten those in the middle overs, probably we would have won this game,” he added.
Rahul was the top scorer for his team and finished with 79 off 58 but it wasn’t enough. The 30-year-old reflected on his team’s rather conservative approach in the middle overs during the chase and stated where they could have done better.
“This season has been like every other season – a good learning. As a team, it has been a challenging season, a good season. We learnt a lot,” said Rahul.
“Now looking back, yes it is just about two big hits in the middle overs and that could have gotten us over the line. It’s not that we didn’t try to hit those fours or sixes, we were trying but I think in the middle they bowled really well.
“Harshal Patel’s two overs pushed us back a little. He gave away just seven or eight runs, he really changed his pace well. He bowled to the field and that pushed us back a little bit.”
Rahul also stated that going forward, both he and his team need to do better while chasing.
“In this season, I have gone through the stats and realised that my scores in the second innings haven’t been much,” said Rahul.
“But this was a big game and when you come to big games, you forget what happened in the last 14 games. You try to play this game as a fresh game and try to give your best. I tried to do that today as well. This has been a good learning experience. I enjoy chasing but at times it clicks, at times it doesn’t. Overall, our stats have not been good while chasing, and we need to improve that.”
Watch KL Rahul’s press conference here.
Also read:
IPL 2022 Eliminator, LSG vs RCB as it happened: Patidar, Harshal star as RCB win by 14 runs
‘An innings we’ll never forget’: Reactions to Rajat Patidar’s incredible IPL playoff century for RCB
‘Exhilarating, nerve-wracking contest:’ Reactions to RCB pipping LSG to enter Qualifier 2
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