Rajat Patidar’s maiden T20 century, a combined effort by the bowlers in the death overs helped the Royal Challengers Bangalore beat the Lucknow Super Giants by 14 runs in the IPL 2022 eliminator at the Eden Gardens, Kolkata on Wednesday. 

Faf du Plessis and co will now face the Rajasthan Royals in the Qualifier 2 to book a berth in the finals. 

Also read: IPL 2022: Breaking down Rajat Patidar’s ton vs Lucknow Super Giants

Patidar looked unstoppable. The Indore-based opener scored 112 runs in 54 balls with the help of 12 boundaries and seven maximums. Coming in to bat when RCB were 4/1, the 28-year-old added 66 with Virat Kohli (25) first before sharing another 92 off 41 balls with Dinesh Karthik (37 not out off 23) to take RCB past the 200-mark.

The team ended up with 207 runs on the board. For LSG, the only saving grace was Mohsin Khan’s superb figures of 1 for 25.

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Chasing 208 runs, skipper KL Rahul led Lucknow Super Giants’ efforts with 78 off 59 balls. His side could manage 193 for 6 after 20 overs.

It was some brilliant death bowling by Harshal Patel (4-0-25-1) that helped RCB contain KL Rahul and co. The pacer was handed the crucial 18th over. He bowled wide yorkers and off-cutter variations and tilted the match in his team’s favour.

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Once Josh Hazlewood removed Rahul in the 19th over, RCB team in spirit had already boarded the flight to Ahmedabad.

Talking about why LSG lost, skipper KL Rahul said, “I think it’s quite obvious – the reasons why we didn’t win. We let ourselves down in the field. Dropping easy catches never helps. Difference was obviously Patidar playing such a knock. When someone in the top three scores a hundred, more often the team wins. They fielded really well and we were poor.”