Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) suffered another defeat in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024 campaign, going down to Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) by 1 run in a thrilling contest. The narrow margin of the defeat sums up the close contest it was. What made the battle even more intense was the controversial dismissal of Virat Kohli who was caught and bowled by KKR pacer Harshit Rana after being troubled by an above-waist full toss. Despite reviewing the call, Kohli remained out, but that didn’t prevent him from taking up the matter with the umpires.
Kohli engaged in an intense on-field chat with the umpires before taking out his frustration at a trash can near the RCB dugout. But, the star batter had no option other than returning to the dressing room and leaving the chase in the hands of his teammates.
As the match ended in a 1-run defeat for RCB, Kohli was spotted speaking to another official, who tried to explain the reason behind the delivery from Harshit being labelled ‘legal’. The animated chat went on for a few minutes, with Kohli also seemingly arguing his case. Here’s the video:
Virat Kohli had a chat with the umpire after the match. pic.twitter.com/mya45sbKW2
— Mufaddal Vohra (@mufaddal_vohra) April 21, 2024
After the game, RCB skipper Faf du Plessis admitted that not much could be done on the controversy, as Virat was given out as per the ‘rules’ of the game.
“It was crazy, rules are rules, Virat and myself thought that the ball was higher than the waist (on Kohli’s dismissal), I guess they measured from the popping crease, one team thinks it’s high, the other doesn’t. That’s how the game goes at times. Then the partnership, it was magnificent (on the Jacks-Patidar partnership), but when you don’t win too many games, some sort of panic sets in and the Narine over was game-changing.
“You don’t feel that you have time to settle down and bat (on the evolution of the IPL this season), the game doesn’t allow it to do that, obviously you have an extra batter, but in chases like these, you have to keep going. The match-up against Narine, I thought that was the game changing over. The small things, I am actually proud of the boys tonight, the way we bowled and fielded, we did give away a couple of big overs towards the end, but I thought we kept them down to a par score,” Du Plessis said after the game.
