Delhi Capitals suffered a massive loss against the Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB), which effectively ended their campaign in the 2024 edition of the IPL on Sunday, May 12. From 124/2, the Capitals were able to restrict RCB to 187/9 in a remarkable comeback but the total seemed to be enough as Rajat Patidar, the top-scorer for RCB mentioned during the mid-innings as the ball was stopping a bit and the Delhi batters failed to chase it down, falling 47 runs short of it.
Delhi's poor fielding had a major role to play in RCB, especially Patidar and Will Jacks being able to stitch that 88-run stand as they both were dropped twice each, once both in an over, that did cost the visitors a few runs and according to the bowling coach, James Hopes, that was the primary reason for the defeat.
"I think you always take a 188 here. They got a few too many. What do we drop, 4 catches? We take those catches, we probably restrict them to 160-165, which could have been the difference in the end. But when you go out there and field like that and don’t put it together with the bat, you’re not going to win too many games in the tournament,” Hopes said in the post-match press conference.
"We made plenty of mistakes tonight. Two of your better T20 batters getting run out. One in unfortunate circumstances [Fraser-McGurk] when he got off to another quick start and Stubbsy, who is up there with the best finishers in the tournament getting run out the way he did, that sort of thing hamstrung us a little bit and we never came back from it," former Australian all-rounder added.
Delhi got off to a poor start losing four wickets in the powerplay including an unfortunate run out of Jake Fraser-McGurk at the non-striker's end. Axar Patel was the lone warrior for his side on his captaincy debut but it was too much in the end for him to do as the wickets kept falling, eventually for the team to get bundled out for 140.
"We have to win and we have to win big. Fortunately, we are going back to Delhi where big scores have been a norm for this tournament. It's going to be up to us to put a big score on the board and keep them a fair below for us to have any chance in this tournament. Today was our chance to really get in the mix for playing finals but now we have left it up to fate," Hopes said on DC's chances, which are really bleak.
