Royal Challengers Bangalore skipper Virat Kohli did not back off from taking the blame fully on himself for his team's defeat to Kings Eleven Punjab in IPL 2020 encounter after he dropped KXIP skipper KL Rahul twice, which ultimately proved to be fatal for RCB's fortunes in the game.


In the post match presentation, Kohli said that had he not dropped Rahul, who went onto score a record breaking unbeaten century, KXIP would not have been able post a 200 plus total in the match.

“I have to stand in front and take the brunt of it, not the best day in the office, couple of important chances of KL when he was set and that cost us 35-40 runs at a later stage. Maybe if we restricted them to 180 we wouldn’t have been under pressure from ball one of the chase,” said Kohli at the post-match presentation.

Rahul's whirlwind ton which also happened to be the first century by a batsman in IPL 2020 propelled KXIP to a mammoth 206-run total and set the platform for a thumping win as RCB were bundled out for 109 in 17 overs.

“We know exactly where we went wrong and I have to put my hand up and say a couple of important chances went down. There are days when these kind of things happen on the cricket field, they happen and we have to accept them.

“We have had a good game (against Sunrisers Hyderabad), we have had a bad game and now it is time to move on and learn from the mistakes we made,” said Kohli.

KL Rahul made RCB pay heavily after Kohli dropped the eventual centurion twice in a space of two overs. Kohli first dropped Rahul of Steyn's bowling when he spilled a catch at the boundary due to misjudging it

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Six deliveries later, Navdeep Saini outfoxed Rahul with a slower one as the KXIP skipper scooped one high in the air. Kohli came sprinting from the long-off region to take a high catch but eventually dropped an easy chance.

Rahul got a second lease of life and made the most of the opportunity by smashing 48 runs of just 13 deliveries, thereby changing the course of the game.

On sending the young Josh Philippe ahead of himself at number 3, Kohli said: “He has batted at the top of the order for Western Australia and done well in the BBL as well, early days in the tournament so we thought we will maximise his ability and see how we go from there on. We thought we will give ourselves a bit of depth in the middle overs.”

The Australian wicketkeeper-batsman had batted in the middle-order in RCB’s first game against Sunrisers. RCB next play defending champions Mumbai Indians here on September 28.