Patidar hits season’s fastest ton to keep RCB hopes alive
Royal Challengers, in search of a maiden IPL crown, set up Qualifier 2 against Rajasthan Royals
KOLKATA: Rajat Patidar had gone unsold at this year’s IPL auction. When he joined Royal Challengers Bangalore as a replacement for Luvnith Sisodia on April 3, Patidar was signed for ₹20 lakh, the base price for uncapped domestic players. On Wednesday, he scored a 49-ball hundred—the fastest this season and the first by a non-opener in this Ipl—that ultimately spelt out the difference in a high-scoring Eliminator where they beat Lucknow Super Giants by 14 runs.
It rained fours and sixes at the Eden Gardens, most coming off the middle of the bat while some rode a bit of luck. But the most significant boundary was not meant to be one in the first place. Had Deepak Hooda not reacted late to Patidar’s midwicket slog in the 16th over, RCB would have been 130/5 and who knows where from there. That dropped cost LSG dearly, a spot in the second qualifier to be precise. And Patidar made it a point to rub it in quickly. Next three balls, he smoked Ravi Bishnoi for six, four and six to unleash an avalanche of runs that simply buried LSG.
The last five overs of RCB’S innings produced 84 runs, 77 of them coming after that dropped catch.
Together, Patidar and Dinesh Karthik put on 92 runs in just 6.5 overs on an Eden Gardens pitch that stayed true to stroke-making despite the wear and tear of Tuesday’s qualifier. For a team that has always leaned on the big names—a Chris Gayle, Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers or Faf du Plessis, to name a few—to pull them through with the bat, RCB’S campaign this time has often been held together by performances from less popular names like Patidar, Shahbaz Ahmed and Dinesh Karthik who too was dropped by KL Rahul when he was on four off seven balls.
Quinton de Kock’s bat turning in his hand in the first over itself meant any hope of preserving wickets before turning it on in the final overs had quickly gone out of the window. Coming together on 41/2, Hooda and Rahul put on 96 for the third wicket before Wanindu Hasaranga’s
flatter wrong’un shattered Hooda’s stumps. Enter Marcus Stoinis with LSG needing 71 off 32 balls. Hasaranga again bowled a flat googly that Stoinis played out safely but the next ball was given air and the Australian got down on his knee to slog-sweep it over long-on for a six.
When the equation finally boiled down to 55 from 24 balls, RCB had two overs left of Harshal Patel and one each from
Hasaranga and Josh Hazlewood. A four, a six and four singles off the next over from Hasaranga further wore down the equation to 41 off 18 balls, completely gettable in this day and age. In came Patel with a reputation of defending fewer runs in the past. Round the wicket, he conceded six wides before going back to over the wicket. Then came a teaser in the form of a short ball that Stoinis pulled and missed. Next ball was wide but not wide enough to be called, as Stoinis had thought when he let that go. Two dots and the pressure was back on Stoinis. And this time Stoinis went after a back of the length ball to find—who else but—patidar at deep cover. Next over, Hazlewood removed Rahul to end LSG’S memorable run.