Their seven-match wining streak broke today with a heavy 111-run defeat and Royal Challengers Bangalore skipper Virat Kohli reckons that the jolt has come just at the right time.
Bangalore slumped to second-largest defeat in IPL against Kings XI Punjab while chasing a mammoth 233 to win.
Kohli said it was good that the defeat has come before the play-offs as it will give them a chance to regroup.
“It’s a good reality check, we needed something like this to re-group, see our faults and correct them going forward.
You can not go and win everytime. Good that it has happened before the semifinals,” Kohli said after the match.
The stand-in Bangalore skipper said the way Adam Gilchrist (106) and Shaun Marsh (79 not out) batted, his bowlers had no chance.
“We didn’t bowl well but all the shots they hit were clean shots, so we couldn’t do much about that. I thought we could restrict them to 160 after the first six overs but after that the next five overs I don’t think we bowled very well. They also batted brilliantly, hats off to them,” he said.
Gilchrist and Marsh raised the highest partnership in T20 cricket -- 206 runs for the second wicket.
Gilchrist, who smashed his second IPL century, said he himself was surprised with his whirlwind knock.
“A pretty important win for us, it will boost our run-rate and we may need that to come into the equation. It’s a bit of a surprise to be honest (the knock) but you need to keep trusting yourself. Twenty20 cricket is a funny game,” he said after being adjudged man-of-the-match.
Gilchrist said it was a conscious decision to go after the bowlers once he and Marsh settled on the pitch.
“It was a nicer batting track today, we felt it’s a small ground and we might be able to make up for any slow overs early on. Marsh has also turned into a dominator. Once we got to the 10-11 over mark, the track had settled down and it was an intentional decision to keep going hard,” he said.
