Royal Challengers Bengaluru batter Devdutt Padikkal has spoken about the evolving nature of the pitches at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium and how the side has adjusted its approach compared to last season.
His comments followed RCB’s emphatic victory over Chennai Super Kings in Bengaluru. After being put in to bat and losing Virat Kohli during the powerplay, RCB still managed to post a total of 250 despite early indications that the surface would be difficult for batting, with noticeable movement on offer.
Padikkal, who registered his second successive half-century, explained how the surface at Chinnaswamy has become increasingly tacky, particularly in the early stages of an innings.
“I think we found that at Chinnaswamy, especially in the initial overs, the pitch has always been a little bit tacky. Even last season, we had a couple of games early on where we struggled with that, and we ended up losing maybe three or four wickets early, which put us on the back foot,” Padikkal said.
RCB’s batting unit has since adapted by applying lessons learned from previous matches at the venue, where early collapses proved costly.
More Read
“We had a conversation midway through last year that when the wicket is behaving in such a way, you have to make sure that you keep wickets in hand. And the moment the ball gets a little older, it becomes much easier to bat on,” he added. “That was the main conversation, to be honest. We had to make sure that we were not three or four down by the 10-over mark. And once we were able to do that, I think we could just go from there.”
So far this season, Bengaluru has hosted two matches, both producing high-scoring contests with totals exceeding 200 in each innings, underlining how conditions tend to ease as the game progresses.
