Dinesh Karthik finished the match against Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in the last over by striking a four and a six in the 20th over. Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) were not chasing a mammoth total, but it all boiled down to the last over. It required a cool-headed Dinesh Karthik to get the job done with four balls to spare.
Karthik received praise from his captain, Faf Du Plessis for his finishing ability. Du Plessis even said that Karthik "is as close as it gets to MS Dhoni" in terms of finishing the innings.
"Wanted that experience towards the end - cool, calm head. The runs were never really too far away from the balls remaining. If we kept wickets in hand, that was going to be key. Just to have that calmness coming in still towards the end, he's probably as ice cool as MS Dhoni as you can get in the last five overs," Faf Du Plessis said at the presentation ceremony of KKR vs RCB.
On winning the match, Faf said, "Very happy - obviously close, small margin games like that are really important in the beginning of the competition to just set the team and go - 'alright that's our competition'. Generally with low scores, you don't want to leave it too late but it was really good Powerplay bowling from their bowlers."
RCB defeated KKR by three wickets courtesy to four wickets by Hasaranga and a sensible batting performance by the team, but it was more about the bowling performance restricting KKR to 128. Kolkata could not even play the full 20 overs as they were bowled out after playing 18.5 overs. For Bangalore, Wanindu Hasaranga bowled a remarkable spell, picking up 4 wickets for 20 runs, while Akashdeep took 3 wickets. Harshal Patel bagged two wickets and Mohammad Siraj got one wicket.