IPL 2023 | RCB trying its best to make the Playoffs, remarks Dinesh Karthik
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Dinesh Karthik has urged RCB fans not to lose hope for the IPL 2023 playoffs despite the worsening scenario for them following back-to-back losses in the competition. He has also highlighted how every team have been performing this year, leading the edition to become competitive like never before.
On Tuesday at Wankhede Stadium, Dinesh Karthik showed glimpses of returning to the good-old form by scoring a breezy 18-ball 30, which eventually helped Royal Challengers Bangalore to finish on 199/6 against Mumbai Indians. However, it did not come in a winning cause, courtesy of Suryakumar Yadav’s exceptional 35-ball 83 and rookie Nehal Wadhera’s unbeaten 34-ball 52. Riding on their impressive knocks, the five-time champions reached the target in just 16.3 overs with six wickets to spare.
The defeat against MI led RCB to slip to seventh on the points table. The Faf du Plessis-led side have bagged 10 points with five victories, but six defeats meant each of the upcoming fixtures from here on will be a do-or-die contest for them to keep their chances of qualifying in the Playoffs intact. More so because five teams, including RCB, have managed to secure five wins in their respective 11 matches this season, and all of them have good chances to advance to the next round.
In an email interaction with SportsCafe through Parimatch Sports, Karthik mentioned they know where they are at this point and he and the Red and Gold brigade are looking forward to playing bold in their remaining three fixtures in order to progress to the Playoffs. “It’s a very interesting stage in the tournament, all the teams are playing really well so far in the tournament. There is so much competition, unlike every year IPL has grown from stature to stature and RCB is trying its best to do its best to get into the Play-offs,” the 37-year-old said.
“The points table is at a very precarious place since so many teams are playing good cricket, anybody can beat any team on a given day, and that's what makes this tournament so good.”
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When asked how their star trio du Plessis, Virat Kohli, and Glenn Maxwell keep motivating others, Karthik replied they have been consistently inspiring the youngsters on the off the field. Besides, their sparking contributions with the bat, as per Karthik, will influence the franchise’s youngsters to step up regularly in the future.
“Faf, Maxi, and Virat have been phenomenal this season. They got the bulk of the runs for RCB, being very inspiring personalities who make sure that everybody in the dressing room is feeling comfortable even after the amount of cricket they have played over a period of time. The kind of performance that they put up is inspiring for all the youngsters and I am sure that all of them are trying to gain and observe everything that they can learn from the 3-great cricketers,” Karthik added.
Talking about his role as a finisher, Karthik admitted their prolific top three have made his job look easy in the death overs. The wicket-keeper is hopeful that the trio will keep scoring runs in the rest of the season to take them to lift the elusive title.
“...Their consistency in a way has been soo good because as a finisher you just need to go there and do whatever you can. Sometimes it reduces the number of balls you play which becomes a challenge as well, so it’s been very interesting so far. I just hope they keep going and get as many runs as possible,” he signed off.