How GT were bounced out

It was a final that was not what it was billed to be - figuratively, of course, if not literally. Royal Challengers Bengaluru sleepwalked to the title, and it would not have been possible without assistance from the opposition, who all but bounced themselves out of the contest.

Playing in front of the home crowd, Gujarat Titans were expected to make a spectacle out of the final but they ended up handing the trophy to the opposition gift-wrapped. Their failure to handle the short ball proved to be their undoing and the much-anticipated contest ended as one of the most one-sided finals in the competition's history.

RCB made the most of the red-soil component of the mixed-soil pitch with their short-ball strategy. Red soil is known to generate extra bounce and, on Sunday night, the ball kept rearing up viciously at the batters. The RCB bowlers kept digging it in short, and it was not easy for the GT batters to negotiate the climbing deliveries on a pitch that was also holding, turning and rising.

"It's not pre-decided," revealed Rajat Patidar, the RCB captain, virtually stating that it was his bowlers' call to bang it in short after experiencing the conditions. "I don't go to the bowlers often because I know they have their plans. I have a lot of belief in them because they spend a lot of time one-on-one with Omkar Salvi sir (the RCB bowling coach).

"They have their plans and they are executing them pretty well. I don't disturb them. I am pretty confident in my bowlers. We had not pre-decided to bowl short. I think it was the call of each bowler who was out there to use the short ball."

Close to 40 per cent of RCB's deliveries - 45 out of 120 balls - were dug in short. The tactic worked, with the rewards both instant and significant. The RCB bowlers claimed six wickets - Shubman Gill, Sai Sudharsan, Nishant Sindhu, Arshad Khan, Jason Holder and Rashid Khan - through their short-ball strategy. The only batters who were not dismissed off short-of-a-length deliveries were Jos Buttler and Rahul Tewatia. Buttler was stumped off a wide delivery from Krunal Pandya, while Tewatia mistimed a slog off Rasikh Dar's slower ball.

As Patidar put it, Bhuvneshwar Kumar (2/29), Josh Hazlewood (2/37) and Dar (3/27) and even Jacob Duffy (0/38) decided among themselves how to go about their business on a rather difficult pitch. While Dar was the most successful bowler of the night for RCB, Bhuvneshwar was arguably the standout performer with the ball.

His two Powerplay overs cost just 11 runs and yielded a wicket, with GT struggling to cope with his accuracy, variations and bounce. Sudharsan was undone by a head-high delivery that he attempted to pull. The shot selection of Sudharsan in particular, and the GT batters in general, left much to be desired, but Bhuvneshwar's versatility made life especially difficult for them.

The match was effectively won and lost in the Powerplay overs of the two innings. RCB were aware of the importance of GT's top three batters and peppered them with short balls from the outset. Openers Gill and Sudharsan, both in the course of 700-plus run seasons, fell to short-pitched deliveries before the end of the fourth over. Those initial setbacks left GT on the back foot and they could only manage 155/8.

"We lost a couple of early wickets and then we kind of lost the momentum in the middle; we couldn't really get going. But then we knew we were playing the finals. (To defend) 150, 160, if we get a couple of early wickets in the Powerplay, we are always in the game. I think (we conceded) 15-20 runs too many in the Powerplay. Had we restricted them to around 50-55 runs, we still would have had a chance. But I think they got away a little bit in the Powerplay (70/2)," Gill said ,looking back.

GT needed early wickets to have any chance of defending the total, but RCB's opening pair of Virat Kohli and Venkatesh Iyer went on the offensive from the outset and took the match out of GT's reach. "I just told Venky (Venkatesh Iyer) one thing, we need to kill the game in the Powerplay. And he said, 'yeah, let's go'," Virat Kohli said, revealing their approach to the chase.

"So it was total clarity. There was no doubt at any stage when both of us were going. We just wanted to strike. We just wanted to take the bowlers on because we knew in a big game, if you lose a couple of wickets, things can get tricky. So never let the run rate go up to seven and a half, eight." Kohli himself contributed to the initial burst by smashing his fastest IPL half century (off 25 deliveries).

GT's director of cricket Vikram Solanki contested the perception that his batters failed to handle the short stuff from RCB. "We could look at matters of statistics as far as what lengths were bowled and what was done as far as the top order was concerned. Did we travel late? Did we do this or that?

"That's all irrelevant now, to be totally honest with you. The fact is that RCB have beaten us today, and we must be strong enough to hold our heads high and be proud of the campaign we've put together, while also being gracious enough to congratulate RCB," Solanki said, refusing to concede that the Titans were bounced out of the contest. "You could perhaps debate which length was short or not."

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