Flower desires a ‘degree of hostility over a particular threshold’ from RCB.

Following yet another lackluster batting display that resulted in Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s fourth loss in five games. Head coach Andy Flower acknowledged that his team was short on runs on a Jaipur surface that improved with dew. The majority of the scoring was done by their former captain, Virat Kohli. None of the other RCB batsmen showed up on a night when he scored yet another IPL century.

After registering 183 runs on the board, RCB saw RR easily catch up. Thanks to centuries from Jos Buttler and a fifty from captain Sanju Samson.

Flower focused on the batting department’s lack of intent and gave a brutally honest evaluation of the situation.

We do talk about strike rates and aggressiveness. It is because it’s important to comprehend the T20 format, Flower stated in the news conference held after the game.

“There needs to be a point at which animosity is exceeded. You need to put constant pressure on the adversary. Choosing the aggressive route is advised, particularly in fields like this one. It’s a reality that, except Kohli, none of our top five players are now playing at their best. It is a difficult place to be. It’s not for want of effort; they’re putting in a lot of effort and working hard. Simply not shooting at this time. We must fire them if we want to turn things around.”

The only notable performance of the day was Kohli’s century, which also happens to be the joint-slowest IPL century ever. However, captain Faf du Plessis did provide a fair critique of his own. With the opening stand of a century, RCB seemed set to score more than 190 runs, maybe even 200. But once the alliance fell apart. RR used the left-arm speed of Nandre Burger in combination with their spin combo of Yuzvendra Chahal and Ravichandran Ashwin to put pressure on the opposition. In the first half, the surface did provide something for the slower bowlers. RR’s assault took full use of it.

Although RR’s chase was made much easier by the subsequent dew, RCB had started the second half well when Yashasvi Jaiswal fell to Reece Topley in the opening over of the chase. The track’s two-paced aspect, which was occasionally noticeable in the first innings, did persist until the beginning of the chase, but RR handled that stage admirably. Dew is a constant in Indian circumstances, hence RCB most likely required a cushion of fifteen to twenty additional runs to stay in the game. Flower bemoaned the subpar conclusion of the inning following the opening stand’s base.

“We were roughly 107/0 in the 12th over, so considering the base we had, I thought we were a little short (on runs). On a decent pitch, we should have been able to reach 200 or more. However, Topley and Yash got us off to a strong start with the ball, and Siraj played outstandingly up front, but the last over of the powerplay cost us a lot of momentum.”

RCB’s prospects of making the playoffs now appear bleak, as they have only managed two points from five games. The pace at which other teams’ hitters are playing indicates that Bangalore will soon enter the fray. Because of the impact player rule, hitters are now much more daring and may play brave cricket right away. One notable instance of this is the fact that in a week Sunrisers Hyderabad and Kolkata Knight Riders both surpassed the highest-ever IPL total. Royal Challengers Bangalore established it in 2013. Flower is aware that to get out of this mess, his squad must get their act together as soon as possible.

“We are one out of five, and neither side wants to be in that situation. Yes, there are some problems with our batting. While Kohli is in incredible form, the other men are having trouble with confidence and form. We are exerting every effort to instill a sense of strength and self-assurance in them. The competition has demonstrated that team scores and hostility are only heading in one direction. In order to put pressure on the opposition, the lads must have all of their form and confidence. That form hasn’t been discovered yet.”

When asked to assess the loss during the presentation ceremony, skipper Faf du Plessis expressed similar feelings. Despite scoring 44 off 33 balls, the South African’s fluidity was lacking during the innings. After the bowlers sent him packing, the other batsmen could not adjust to the surface’s characteristics. So Kohli had to do everything. The skipper of the Royal Challengers Bangalore thought that the two innings’ batting conditions differed significantly.

“We discovered that the surface was low and tough during the first innings when batting with Kohli tonight. When we were batting, we thought that 190 would be a good score. I did think that we could have capitalized on ten or fifteen more runs in the last over or two,” Faf said.

However, judging from the way their spinners bowled in the middle, it was difficult to strike because the ball stayed rather low. They made a wise choice to pursue it, as you could see by the way it behaved much better in the evening with the dew. However, you believe that you could have pushed a little bit more and passed the 190–195 barrier in retrospect.”