R oyal Challengers Bengaluru’s (RCB) hopes of exorcising a 17-year jinx hinge on their experienced batting unit finding its range when they face familiar foes Chennai Super Kings in their Indian Premier League match here on Friday.
The Royal Challengers have beaten the Super Kings only once at Chepauk — in the inaugural edition of the tournament in 2008. In the current RCB squad, only star batter Virat Kohli was part of that moment and now he will like to breach the CSK’s fortress for a second time.
But that’s easy to dream. As ever, the Chennai outfit is constructed to win their home matches on a pitch that offers considerable help to spinners.
They have the ever-familiar Ravindra Jadeja and have brought back ‘old boy’ Ravichandran Ashwin through last year’s players’ auction.
The Chennai side has also added Afghanistan left-arm wrist spinner Noor Ahmad too to the squad, and the troika did well against fellow five-time champions Mumbai Indians a few days back.
The triumvirate bowled 11 overs against Mumbai, conceding an appreciable 70 runs for five wickets.
The pitch is expected to retain its character for this match as well, and the RCB batters, led by Kohli, will have to lift their game several notches to outwit an experienced bowling unit.
Outwit is the key word here. The Royal Challengers’ batting unit should be clever more than downright aggressive to score off CSK’s three-pronged spin unit, and Kohli should lead that charge.
Negating spin has not always been a strong point of Kohli’s batting but in the last two years or so he has showed massive improvement in that department.
Central to that change is his willingness to play more sweep/slog sweeps against spinners, and Kohli will have to bring all those expertise to the table on a blockbuster Friday evening.
But then Kohli alone won’t able to tackle a competent bowling machine, and he will require full-hearted support from Phil Salt, skipper Rajat Patidar, Liam Livingstone, Jitesh Sharma etc.
Looking at the Chepauk pitch, RCB might even consider bringing in Jacob Bethell, possibly for Tim David, who also provide a left-arm spin option.
They will also keep an eye on the fitness of pacer Bhuvneshwar Kumar, who missed the first match against KKR due to a niggle, and if the veteran is fit then he will come in for Rasikh Salam.
On the other hand, the Super Kings will be eager for their middle-order to find its groove as Shivam Dube, Deepak Hooda and Sam Curran faltered against MI in the last match. They should lend more support to Rachin Ravindra and captain Ruturaj Gaikwad, while hoping for another strong cameo from MS Dhoni if it comes to that.
The CSK will also closely monitor the fitness of ace pacer Matheesha Pathirana, who missed the game against Mumbai.
Nathan Ellis may sit out if the Sri Lankan regains his fitness in time.
Teams
Chennai Super Kings: Ruturaj Gaikwad (c), MS Dhoni, Ravindra Jadeja, Shivam Dube, Matheesha Pathirana, Noor Ahmad, Ravichandran Ashwin, Devon Conway, Syed Khaleel Ahmed, Rachin Ravindra, Rahul Tripathi, Vijay Shankar, Sam Curran, Shaik Rashid, Anshul Kamboj, Mukesh Choudhary, Deepak Hooda, Gurjanpreet Singh, Nathan Ellis, Jamie Overton, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Ramakrishnan Ghosh, Shreyas Gopal, Vansh Bedi, Andre Siddarth.
Royal Challengers Bengaluru: Rajat Patidar (c), Virat Kohli, Yash Dayal, Josh Hazlewood, Phil Salt, Jitesh Sharma, Liam Livingstone, Rasikh Salam, Suyash Sharma, Krunal Pandya, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Swapnil Singh, Tim David, Romario Shepherd, Nuwan Thushara, Manoj Bhandage, Jacob Bethel, Devdutt Padikkal, Swastik Chhikara, Lungi Ngidi, Abhinandan Singh, Mohit Rathee.
