IPL 2026 opener saw RCB register a thumping win over SRH at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium on Saturday (March 28). Chasing 202 runs to win, the defending champions got over the line while chasing a target of 202 runs with a little over five overs to spare.
The Performance
The chase was led by Virat Kohli and Devdutt Padikkal as both batters scored attacking half-centuries, with the former staying unbeaten till the end.
The Opposition
If we talk about the opposition, it got off to a shaky start by losing three wickets inside the powerplay, and it took a partnership between captain Ishan Kishan and Heinrich Klassen to get the team’s innings back on track by adding 97 runs for the fourth wicket
The Comeback
When it appeared that SRH would comfortably post 210-220 runs on the board, the RCB bowlers made a strong comeback by picking wickets at regular intervals at the backend of the innings answer well supported by Philip Salt, who took a couple of stunning catches and played a vital role in restricting the orange arm to 201 runs
The Bowling
The already inexperienced bowling lineup of the SRH had no answers to the counterattack that was delivered by Kohli, Padikkal and Rajat Patidar and looked short of plans.
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The Reaction
Talking about the underwhelming performance of the bowlers during the post-match press conference, SRH head coach Daniel Vettori said that they should have bowled with a lot more discipline. In the words of Vettori, “You have to get a good start (with the ball), which we did against (Phil) Salt, but then I just think we weren’t at our best with the ball. We weren’t as disciplined as we needed to be, and we gave a lot of scoring opportunities to Virat and Padikkal, who played exceptionally well”.
“We should have been able to maintain a little bit more (discipline) after getting that important wicket of Salt. So, it was a very good batting performance by RCB and one of our poorer bowling performances,” he added.
The Lesson
Vettori was of the opinion that they failed to implement the plans the way the opposition bowlers did “I think we learned a lot from how RCB bowled and what was effective and what wasn’t, but we just weren’t able to implement that. You don’t want to have a rusty performance because of how important every game is in the IPL, particularly how to start.
“But today was one of our challenging bowling displays. We saw at the back end when we started to go back to our usual disciplines that we could actually be effective and take some wickets. But I think we just missed our lengths too much. Duffy in particular showed the length to bowl on that surface,” he said.
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The Trust
The former New Zealand spinner said that with the ever-evolving demand of the game, they will have to adapt, while admitting that a score of 200 might not be enough in the modern game, the way it was a few years ago.
Coach’s Corner
According to Vettori, “I think 200, maybe a couple of years ago, you’d think you’re safe for 200, but I think we understand where the game’s gone and how destructive that RCB batting line-up is.”
“We’ve got a lot of trust in our batting unit. You see Aniket (Verma) coming in at seven and being still able to be aggressive and put us in a position where we had a chance of a defendable total. I think the fact that we don’t expect Abhi and Trav to do it every game, we expect them to do it, win a couple of games a season, and we hand that off to all of the batting unit.
“So that top seven’s incredibly impressive, and even after that tough start to get to 200 shows the calibre of that group. I think they’ve just got confidence that they can go out there and play that style, and they understand that we need big scores because of the nature of the IPL these days,” he noted.
The Fitness
Vettori also shared an update on English fast bowler Brydon Carse, who wasn’t a part of the playing XI against RCB. “He got hit on the hand in the nets when he was batting, on his bowling hand, cleared of any break, but quite a lot of swelling, and he tried to push for the game, but it was difficult for him to hold the ball. “So he’s been improving, so we’re hoping he’s available for selection for Kolkata,” Vettori said.