An RCB Story

[jammyd]

Review of last game:
Positives: batting wise we were great with Gayle and Rossouw showing their class. Bowling wise, Patel was very economical and Dinda and Sammy took some wickets.
Negatives: Kohlis failure was the only real negative as Aravind (1-30) and Nachim (0-27) both bowled ok.

We move onto the next game where unfortunately it is a spinning pitch so Chahal comes in for Badrinath.

[jammyd]

We lose the toss and are put into bat, against a side full of spinners. Gayle (66 off 47) and Rossouw (30 off 20) but got us off to a good start before Kohli (63 off 41) and De Villers (22* off 10) gave us some late hitting as we end on 183-3. All of their bowlers went for at least 32 runs but none went for more than 40.
Verdict: I think we are slightly ahead but a lot will depend on Chahal if we can't get early wickets.

We started off well as Marsh was run out off the first ball of the game then Aravind got Vijay for 11. Maxwell (35 off 22) and Miller recovered well, especially hitting Patel out of the attack (2-39-0). Chahal (1-38) didn't offer much and despite Dindas great bowling (1-22), Miller (94* off 47) was too good for us and they won by 5 wickets with 3 balls remaining. Heartbreaking but a good comeback from our awful start to the sea sob.

1. Dinda for 1-22 when everyone else got smashed on a pitch that didn't favour him.
2. Gayle for 66 off 47
3. Kohli for 63 off 41

[jammyd]

I'm not going to do a review of that game as it is the end of our season, but I will do a review of the season generally.
Positives:
Rossouw looks like a good opener to partner Gayle, and our top 4 looked very solid. Karthik scored very quickly at a good average and Sammy performed surprisingly with bat and ball. Patel, Sammy, Nachim, Aravind and especially Dinda all proved very reliable bowling wise.

Negatives:
A lack of depth in our batting line up. Apart from our top 4 and Karthik and Sammy, I couldn't trust anyone for runs. Singh and Kahn were both given opportunities but they are very young. Starc was a huge disappointment and we lack a good spinner.

[jammyd]

Player of the year awards:
1. Dinda 43
2. Gayle 39
3. Rossouw 38
4. Aravind 30
5. Patel 28
6. Karthik 25
6. Sammy 25
8. Kohli 24
9. De Villers 19
10.Chahal 5
11. Nachim 3

That was a very surprising top 3, considering Dinda and Rossouw barely played for RCB in real life, and Rossouw is not a natural opener. It was also good to see lots of different players step up to the plate. What was slightly disappointing is Kohli and De Villers at 8 and 9, when I expected them to be top 3 material. To be fair, Kohli did get lots of starts but he only went on a few times, so he did contribute with the bat quite a lot.