Follow UsOne of the three players retained by Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) this season, Glenn Maxwell opens up about the torrid time he had with Kings XI Punjab (KXIP) in the 2020 season.
Often left to face just a few deliveries, Maxwll managed just 108 runs from 11 innings at a strike-rate of 101.88. Also, he did not hit a single six the entire tournament. "That was obviously a hard time, the previous two years went very good but I struggled to get momentum throughout the tournament," Maxwell said on RCB Podcast.
"2020 season was a bit of a nightmare. Nothing really went right. T20 cricket can be hard if you're a middle-order player.
"You're not getting to play a lot of balls in the middle. You're not getting consistency. KL and Mayank were making truckloads of runs. Pooran was smacking as well, and a lot of times I ended up facing less than an over or two."
The Australia batter also said that he did not have the abiity to tonk sixes like someone like Andre Russell and needed some time to settle in. "I was like, 'I might get even fewer balls and it's going to be tougher for me.' I'm not like Andre Russell who can come out and hit the first ball for six," Maxwell said.
"I need time. To their credit, they stuck with me because I was bowling really well and was fielding and doing a lot of work with the captain and bowlers. But batting-wise, if you don't get the rhythm early on, it's really hard to rediscover."
After a poor showing in 2020, RCB bought Maxwellfor INR 14.25 crore. He scored 513 runs at 42.75 to go with a strike-rate of 144.10 in 14 innings.
RCB will begin their IPL 2022 campaign against Punjab Kings on March 27 at the DY Patil Stadium, Navi Mumbai.