Kolkata Knight Riders won against Royal Challengers Bangalore in IPL 2023, ending their four-match losing streak. KKR is currently in seventh place on the points table with six points from eight matches. RCB’s stand-in skipper, Virat Kohli, blamed the team’s poor fielding and soft dismissals for gifting KKR an easy win. Kohli admitted that they deserved to lose and were not professional enough.
KKR scored 200/5 after being put into bat, with Nitish Rana scoring 48 runs off 21 balls after being dropped twice. In response, RCB managed to score 179/8. Kohli said that the team dropped two chances while fielding, which cost them 25-30 runs. He also mentioned that they suffered from four-five soft dismissals while batting.
RCB started their chase of 201 with a good start, but Faf du Plessis and Glenn Maxwell got out cheaply. Kohli’s 54 led their run chase before being caught at the boundary with Venkatesh Iyer taking a stunning diving catch. Kohli said that they hit straight to the fielders and were one partnership short of winning the game.
Varun Chakravarthy was declared player-of-the-match after taking three wickets for 27 runs, including the wickets of Maxwell, Mahipal Lomror, and Dinesh Karthik. He dedicated the win to his newborn son and wife and thanked AC Pratheepan and Abhishek Nayar for their support. Chakravarthy said he enjoyed the challenge of bowling the difficult overs and liked that Nitish gave him the ball whenever he wanted him to do the job.
