In a nutshell
Kings XI Punjab once again turned in an all-round performance, and for the second match running chased down a modest target easily, led from the front by their captain Glenn Maxwell. Despite a late blitz by AB de Villiers, the Royal Challengers could not put up an above-par score on a slow Indore pitch and failed in defending the low target.
How it unfolded
AB de Villiers finally made his way to the Bangalore team after recuperating from an injury, but in order to accommodate four overseas players, the Royal Challengers made the bold decision to drop Chris Gayle from the team. Shane Watson won the toss and decided to bat first. However, he didn’t quite get the start he would have hoped for, and himself got out in the first over to Axar Patel. The Royal Challengers found scoring on the slow Indore pitch difficult, and were unable to build any substantial partnerships half-way through the first innings. By the end of 12 overs, they had only 65 runs on the board at less than run a ball, and had lost three wickets. The Punjab bowlers did a good job of keeping the dangerous de Villiers under control till the 15th over. Unable to strike against the spinners, de Villiers picked out Varun Aaron for his initial assault in the 16th over, and did not spare any of the medium pacers in the death overs. He hit 9 sixes in his unbeaten innings of 89 runs, but the blitz came too late: RCB were able to score only 148 runs in the first innings, a well below par total for the ground.
Defending such a low total would have required Bangalore to bowl tightly against the Punjab, just like how Punjab did to them in the first innings. But the Royal Challengers were unable to do so. Hashim Amla and Manan Vohra started well against the Bangalore bowlers, and scored 43 runs in the powerplay overs without losing a wicket. When Vohra got out at the end of 6th over, Punjab once again gambled by sending Axar Patel up the batting order. This was a low-risk move, since by this time the required run-rate was already in the low 6’s. Patel failed to capitalize on this chance, but this hardly dented the chase. Captain Glenn Maxwell once again shepherded the chase for Punjab, and made sure that his team reached the target with a substantial number of overs to spare.
Where the game was won
The Kings bowlers did a great job of restricting the batting pace of Bangalore right from the start of the first innings. Man of the match Axar Patel in particular was terrific, taking out Shane Watson in the very first over and conceding only 12 runs. He topped the bowling chart with a Win Probability Added (WPA) of 0.252.
Where the Punjab bowlers succeeded, Bangalore bowlers failed, allowing Amla and Vohra to build a substantial partnership in the powerplay, and taking out any wind from the defense of the paltry first innings total. And Maxwell later made sure that they wrapped up the chase quickly to further beef-up their Net Run-Rate score in the points table.
What this means for the tournament
Kings XI Punjab are now second in the points table, with only Sunrisers Hyderabad above them. Two well-executed chases means that they also have a substantial lead in NRR over the third-placed Knight Riders. The Royal Challengers Bangalore, on the other hand, find themselves in the bottom-half of the table after having lost two of their three matches.
Takeaways
Kings XI Punjab seem to have found the right team combination to start off their tournament. They did not tinker with their starting XI, and have no reasons to do for the future matches. Having a healthy, tight-knit unit to field in T20 tournaments is almost like half the tournament won. They are showing a form similar to their superb run in the 2014 season, and appear well-set for a deep run in this season as well.
The same cannot be said about the RCB. They have some of the most expensive players in the tournament, and perhaps some of the most talented as well. However, injured and out-of-form players are giving the team a hard time to pick the right starting combination. They are desperately hoping for Kohli to get fit soon. They left out Gayle for this match but still ended up with an underwhelming total. For their next match, they will once again be pondering on how to manage their pool of overseas players, and most importantly, the right team composition that can consistently win matches for them.