Royal Challengers Bangalore’s bowlers have suffered much punishment in the closing stages of innings this IPL season but they finally delivered on Tuesday, leading their side to an important victory over Mumbai Indians.
Tim Southee, who along with Mohammed Siraj saw RCB home in the death overs, felt the home side’s seamers had assessed the conditions well, resisting the urge to try cutters and slower deliveries when the ball was new.
“First and foremost, we went to our strongest skill set and that’s trying to swing the ball...and we were able to take those early wickets. Once it stopped swinging, we adapted to that, bowling the cross-seam deliveries which were holding the surface. We were reasonably smart as a bowling unit and we assessed the conditions really well.”
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The 20th over of the RCB innings, when Colin de Grandhomme clobbered three sixes off Mitchell McClenaghan, was a turning point in the game, Southee felt.
“Mumbai had bowled well up until that point. Colin was able to get a few out from the middle and we sort of scraped through to a good score thanks to that last over. And then the way we started with the ball...those two were probably two key moments in the game,” he said.
Shane Bond, Mumbai’s bowling coach, felt three bad overs in the first innings had cost his side the game.
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“I think the total was 15 runs above par. It’s a sense of deja vu for us. We bowled 17 overs really well and we bowled three overs (20th - 24 runs, 10th - 20, 4th - 22) that were terrible. When you do that on a wicket that is difficult it’s always going to make it tough. Coming into the last over, anything under 160 would have been good for us, but 168 was always going to be a difficult run-chase,” he said.