“Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things.”
We would be lying if we were to say that Royals skipper Sanju Samson doesn’t live by it. Maybe we should’ve scored at least 200. Maybe (well definitely) we should not have dropped those early chances. Maybe we could’ve done many things differently against Punjab Kings. But maybe, just maybe, we were written off a bit too early. Funny we kept believing till the end: Sanju Samson
“It’s funny that we kept believing that we can win this. But somewhere we had the fight left, we knew we had special bowlers bowling for us and we kept those overs of Mustafizur and Tyagi for the end. It’s a funny game so we actually wanted to give it a try and do our best. If we respect the game, keep fighting, anything can happen in cricket,” Sanju Samson, who was seen smiling throughout the chase, said during the post-match presentation. “To be honest, to get that score (185 in 20 overs) on this wicket, we felt good because we also had the bowling. We are not just a batting team but a fielding team as well. We had field plans for all batters. If not for those [four] dropped catches, we could have won the game earlier,” he further reflected. Strange things have happened in T20s: Kartik Tyagi T20 is indeed an unpredictable format and the variety of talent across teams in the IPL makes it even more competitive. And who better to walk us through RR’s incredible two-run victory, than the man of the moment himself - Kartik Tyagi. The 20-year-old pacer defended 4 runs in the final over against Punjab Kings, who had 8 wickets in hand at the time. Conceding one run and claiming two wickets in such a high-pressure situation, Tyagi produced an over for the ages.
"Feeling happy [with the outcome of the game]. I was injured during the India leg of IPL 2021, and by the time I recovered the tournament got suspended. It really made me sad back then but I’m very happy to get the chance today, this feels really good. I have spoken to seniors for the last few years and they keep telling me that things keep changing in this format, so I need to keep believing,” Tyagi, who is known to be fiercely competitive around his peers, said about the game in the post-match presentation. “I\"ve always heard from everyone and also watched games in this format where strange things have happened. Today, I was fortunate to play a big role in something special. I was bowling a bit too short earlier, later worked on it consciously after getting a lot of feedback,” the player of the match added. Incredible what the bowlers did: Riyan Much like his captain, Riyan Parag was convinced that the match wasn’t over for us even when only 8 runs were required off the final 12 deliveries. “We were doing poorly on the field and the game was slipping away from us. But, in the 19th over I said to Mustafizur from mid-off to ‘not let the game be finished this over and we have a chance with Kartik bowling the 20th’. And, both the boys were brilliant. Defending 8 runs off just the last 2 overs is incredible,” Riyan shared an interesting moment from the match, during the post-match press conference. After Wednesday’s result, we have climbed back to 5th in the points table. The Royals next meet Rishabh Pant’s Delhi Capitals in Abu Dhabi, on the afternoon of September 25. What did think of our win against PBKS? Send in your views on Twitter at @rajasthanroyals or to me @cricketpun_duh
