Kolkata Knight Riders defeated Rajasthan Royals by 7 wickets in Match 47 of Tata IPL. This was 2nd consecutive loss for RR. After the game, Sanju Samson admitted that his side was 15-20 runs short.

Batting first RR scored just 152 runs, despite Shimron Hetmyer playing a cameo in the end. He scored 27 runs off 13 balls but it wasn’t enough to put up a fighting total on the board.

Our Bowlers Did Well: Sanju Samson

Devdutt Padikkal and Jos Buttler couldn’t get going in the batting department for RR, which meant that the pressure to take the

team to a respectable total was on the skipper Sanju Samson. He did start well but slowed down in the end. He scored a 50 but his strike rate at the end of the innings was just 110. Karun Nair who got back into the side also could not capitalise on the opportunity as he got out for 13. Riyan Parag who was sent ahead of Shimron Hetmyer scored 19 off 12 balls but RR would have wanted a little more from him.

RR bowlers did well to take the game deep, but KKR never looked like they were in trouble. They always looked in control of the chase.

“The wicket was a bit slow, but they also bowled really well but with the kind of batting we had, would have liked a few more boundaries at the end and finish off a bit better. I think we were short by 15-20 runs. Personally, we should have batted a bit better.

We have to keep on assessing the game and who is batting with you, wickets at the wrong time stopped myself to keep on going with the momentum. Wanted to build up the partnership and when I wanted to go hard I think they bowled really well and we couldn’t execute our shots”, Samson said about his team’s batting innings.

Sanju Samson had to get medical assistance while batting when asked about the same in the presentation, he said, “Having few niggles from the last couple of games, It’s feeling good now and I’m recovering well.”

When asked about the performance of his bowling unit he said, “It’s a great effort (with the ball), we showed some real fight in the game and the energy was really amazing.”

RR are still 3rd on the points table despite the loss but they would to get back on winning ways as the teams in the bottom half of the table are desperately trying to get their foot in the top 4.

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