Follow UsRoyal Challengers Bengaluru have continued their dream run away from home in the Indian Premier League (IPL) by winning their sixth game outside of the M Chinnaswamy stadium in a row.
On the day, RCB defeated Delhi Capitals by six wickets, courtesy some stellar fast bowling from Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Josh Hazlewood. After that, Krunal Pandya held and advanced the chase along with Virat Kohli to win RCB the game.
Here are the three key talking points from the game:
Barring a game here and there, both Bhuvneshwar Kumar has been quite impactful for RCB in the 2025 edition of the IPL.
Against the Capitals in Delhi, Bhuvneshwar brought up his arsenal of slow deliveries and used them to perfection, getting three wickets for just 33 runs in his four overs. He bowled 11 leg cutters on a slow and sticky pitch, and even clean bowled Ashutosh Sharma with a brilliant slower ball. All in all, 14 out of his 24 deliveries were slow, and he gave only 17 runs, picking two of his three wickets on them.
Meanwhile, Hazlewood was great in the powerplay and dismissed Abhishek Porel to give RCB a good start. He also cleaned up Axar Patel, who threatened to inject momentum in DC’s innings.
Rahul played 39 deliveries and scored just 41 runs on them, struggling to impart any acceleration to his or DC’s innings on a slow pitch. Since Rahul took his time initially after coming in at 44/2 in 4.4 overs, it was expected that he would blast off after seeing off the tricky period, but his innings never got the threshold energy necessary for the launch.
It stagnated the Capitals in the middle overs, where they scored 56 runs between overs 7-15 and lost two wickets. In comparison, RCB scored 79 runs despite losing three early wickets and didn’t lose a single wicket after that when Krunal Pandya and Virat Kohli led the chase for the visiting side.
If not for the middle over rut, DC could have ideally added 15-20 more runs to their total, and in the end, that proved decisive for the Capitals.
Krunal made it to the crease after RCB were in much trouble at 26/3 at the end of the fourth over, and scored a brilliant fifty, not only helping RCB recover, but also finish in the chase.
In the first 28 deliveries, Krunal scored only 25 runs, and he failed to find any rhythm in his innings. However, he kept the scoreboard moving with singles and doubles along with Virat Kohli and didn’t play rash shots to get out.
After that, he changed gears in the 13th over and smashed back-to-back sixes against Mukesh Kumar to get his innings going. He also sent Kuldeep Yadav out of the boundary in the next over to continue the onslaught he began in the last over.
He remained not out and ended up with 73 off 47 deliveries, winning the Player of the Match for his stellar fifty, which came after eight years, 11 months, and 10 days in the IPL.