A 92-run loss in Qualifier 1 with very little of positive note for Gujarat Titans to take into New Chandigarh as they begin the wait for their second bite at the cherry now. Completely outclassed and outplayed by Royal Challengers Bengaluru on the night, the batting and the bowling alike took a beating against the opposition – but as per captain Shubman Gill, it was the fielding that he was most disappointed with.
“I think we were going pretty well until the 12th-13th over, but I don’t think our fielding was on par. Dropped a couple of catches and then our ground fielding was not up to the mark,” said Gill to broadcasters in the post-match interview.
There were certainly a couple of key moments for GT to rue – most importantly, Kagiso Rabada shelling a fairly straightforward chance off Rajat Patidar while the RCB captain was on 20, after which he immediately exploded, going on to score 93*(33).
GT also had a couple of sloppy no-balls, misfieldings, and overthrows cost them in pressure overs – none of which made Gill happy when reflecting on it after the match.
“It’s definitely something we address in team meetings and practice sessions. It wasn’t our day, the intensity was there but under pressure situations we weren’t up to the mark,” he repeated.
Gill keen to ‘forget’ about thrashing
GT had a chance to put their foot on RCB’s throats with Patidar’s wicket, but instead bled runs aplenty late into the batting innings as their missed catches really came to haunt them. With those missed opportunities, RCB hammered their way to 254/5 – and runs on the board are always so valuable in pressure games, as GT would go on to discover, constrained to 51/5 in the powerplay.
“One of those games we would like to forget, and start over in Mohali,” said Gill.
Nevertheless, Gill wasn’t too harsh, stating that GT always believed they had a chance at such a venue, even if the batting was blown apart by some quality RCB bowling, and a little dose of bad luck.
“All about getting a good start. If you get a good powerplay on a ground like this where the ball travels and the outfield is very quick. You can get to any target with the kind of way the wicket was playing and the kind of ground, it could have been chaseable,” he reflected, before saying of opening partner Sai Sudharsan’s hit-wicket: “You don’t see that kind of dismissal very often, so that was unfortunate.”
GT head to Mullanpur, where they will await the victor of the Eliminator between RR and SRH.
