Hyderabad: Former Australia cricketer Aaron Finch defended Virat Kohli’s innings after the star Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) batter scored 43-ball 51 against Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH), saying sometimes a set batter’s role is to take the game deeper, which somewhere limit the intent to hit boundaries.
While opening the inning for RCB, Kohli was quick in power play as he scored 23 in just 11 deliveries but he laboured to score his next 28 runs in 32 deliveries due to some tight overs from T Natarajan and Shahbaz Ahmed.
However, the presence of Rajat Patidar did not let RCB’s scoring rate drop. He came into the game with a strike rate of 125 against pacers and 197 against spinners in this IPL, and banked on his strength to score 20 ball fifty– the joint second-fastest fifty in RCB’s history, which powered Faf du Plessis’ side to 206 in 20 overs, later winning the game by 35 runs.
The former Australian skipper urged people not to consider Kohli’s innings slow as he was trying to build a partnership with Patidar after the early loss of wickets. “I think it is a combination of a few things here. Yes, he got off to an absolute flyer. But after the powerplay, he dropped to 19 from 25. But one thing you have to keep in mind is that Patidar was going crazy at the other end. Sometimes your job as a set batter is to take the game a little bit deeper and get Patidar on strike as much as possible. That’s where the intent to hit boundaries goes out,” said Finch to broadcasters.
Kohli and Patidar added 64 runs in just 35 deliveries for the fourth wicket partnership of which Patidar played the aggressive role and Kohli anchored the inning. Finch felt that the partnership between both the batter was perfect example of building the inning.
“You can look at him in isolation and say ‘yes it dropped.’ But as a partnership, it worked really well. Because the last thing you want when you’re on fire is to be stuck at the non-striker’s end a lot. He did the right thing by getting Patidar up there,” said Finch.