“The guy has been bowling so well throughout the season, you’re bound to have a bad day,” Ambati Rayudu said on ESPNcricinfo’s TimeOut show. “It’s like, it’s like getting a duck. You’re getting a golden duck.
“And if you look at those balls that he has bowled, except for that last ball that [fifth] over to Mitch Marsh [down the leg side], other than that, most of the balls were decent. It’s just some incredible hitting. And he came across Mitch Marsh and Nicholas Pooran, who is just finding form.”
From LSG’s point of view, it was a reminder of what could have been had Marsh and Pooran, two of their batting mainstays last season, had found their form earlier in IPL 2026.
“That’s where it sucks to be a bowler. Like a batter can be betting terribly and just go sweet as, hit one straight up,” Mitchell McClenaghan said. “That’s hard. That’s a bit… it’s the perfect storm, isn’t it? You got Mitch Marsh, who has been in good form. You’ve got LSG out of the competition. So you’ve got a man who doesn’t mind if he gets out because it doesn’t mean anything to the competition. So he’s just swinging.”
Rayudu suggested that CSK were missing a few “smart heads” in the field, men who could have had a quiet word with Kamboj – hint: MS Dhoni – when things were going so horribly wrong for him.
“I feel the CSK side, when you look at them at the ground, they’re not too many smart heads, experienced heads there,” Rayudu said. “Players who could just control the game, who can just go and give [Kamboj] a pat, saying, ‘boss, just wait, hang on for ten seconds, tie your laces up’.
“Not so many cricket smarts on the ground except maybe Sanju [Samson, the wicketkeeper]. And he is generally not someone who… it’s too far away. He doesn’t intervene.
“Maybe ask ‘what do you think a slower ball can do – do you think it’ll work?’ So that will click his thinking. Don’t ever suggest something. Just ask him a question. ‘Do you think we can go this route? Do you think we can bowl a yorker now? Do you think it will work?’ Just change his chain of thought. Don’t get him lost in that moment.”
McClenaghan agreed. “I think that’s a really good point. Sometimes it’s almost frustrating when the keeper runs up to you because it looks bad. You know what I mean? It almost feels worse. But then, you’re right. You need a senior leader at mid-on or mid-off… Like the guys around the world who do it so well, like Chris Jordan and the [Kieron] Pollards and those guys.”
