IPL 2020 | Speed bowlers like Jofra, Rabada and Nortje have had most success in IPL, reflects Steve Smith

So close yet so far, must have been the mood in the Rajasthan Royals camp as they slumped to yet another defeat. It was a game that they should have won the game needing 39 off final five, which wasn't as daunting given a well set Robin Uthappa and Royals' middle-order hero, Rahul Tewatia were in the middle. But, it wasn't to be as DC bowlers were just way too good for RR batsmen to score freely as they lost the game by 13 runs. 

RR skipper, Steve Smith, speaking in the post-match presentation, rued the fact that despite a great start by Buttler and Stokes, in the chase of 162, RR lost wickets in heaps and it made difficult to finish the game with the wicket getting slower and slower. 

"Disappointing. The wicket slowed up a bit as the game went on. We got off to a good start with Jos and Stokesy, then we lost a couple wickets and got another partnership between Stokesy and Sanju, then again lost wickets in clumps and on slow wickets it is hard to make up too many runs at the backend. We needed to take it a bit deeper from some of our batters and we were not able to do that. We thought we bowled well at the back end and restricted them to 160-odd, that was probably around par on this wicket. And the opening partnership got us ahead in the game but we couldn't extend those partnerships, boys were getting in and getting out, not going on to make 50 or 60," Smith asserted in the post-match presentation.

Steve Smith also stated that he feels that in IPL 2020, it's been about the fast bowlers, with higher pace on spectrum getting success, citing examples of Kagiso Rabada, Jofra Archer and Anrich Nortje.  

"It has been the trend in the tournament, the boys that have the air speed have had the most success, Jofra has been great for us and same with Nortje and Rabada for Delhi. They changed things around tonight by bowling with pace, taking pace off and varying it nicely, we weren't able to deal with that. We are not in the greatest position at the moment, so need to move on from this and hopefully come back with a big game in three days time," he concluded. 

Delhi Capitals have now won six of their eight games and are fast moving towards playoffs while on the other hand, RR have three wins and five losses after the same number of games.