After Kings XI Punjab were knocked out of the IPL 2020 following a loss against Chennai Super Kings (CSK), their captain KL Rahul said that the controversial ‘one-short run’ call against them during their first match of the season eventually came back to bite them “very hard”.
KXIP made a remarkable comeback in the second leg of the tournament and finished on 12 points after losing their last two games (against Rajasthan Royals and CSK). Rahul’s men raised hopes of a playoff berth in the middle by winning five games on the trot.
“A lot could have [been different],” Rahul told the host broadcaster after the match against CSK. “It was disappointing. If you look back, there were times where we had a lot of games in our pockets, (but) we couldn’t get over the line and finish. Then we only have ourselves to blame. Starting with the first game, the short run, looking back at it, it’s come back to bite us very hard. It’s life – we all make mistakes, we’ve made a few mistakes this season as a team, we need to accept it, learn from it and come back.”
Punjab’s death bowling was among the major concerns for most part of the tournament, while their middle-order batting also didn’t click as expected, with Glenn Maxwell not hitting form. However, the belated inclusion of Chris Gayle, who was slotted in at No. 3, bolstered their batting, with the Caribbean legend contributing in their wins.
“We didn’t have results going our way in the first half. The team still felt we were playing good cricket, we were patchy at times, the bowling and batting didn’t come together in the first half, but the second half we started doing that really well,” Rahul added.
“Really proud that we gave ourselves an opportunity to come in the top four and unfortunate that today and yesterday’s game didn’t go our way but there’s a lot of things to proud of as a team, so hopefully come back stronger next year and forget this year.”
