Royal Challengers Bengaluru batter Devdutt Padikkal credited his desire to step outside of his comfort zone and “change the foundation” of his hitting for his increasing confidence in white ball games.
Padikkal’s rapid 50 against Chennai Super Kings on Sunday, following his 61 against Sunrisers Hyderabad in the first game, fueled RCB’s batting assault, which resulted in a 43-run victory.
“It’s just a lot of hard work and a lot of self-belief that’s helped me get there. It wasn’t easy to make that change because it was something that I had to change from the foundation that I had in terms of the type of cricket I wanted to play growing up,” PTI quoted Padikkal as saying in the post-match press conference on Sunday.
“The change is something that I had to make consciously and RCB and the whole support staff have been really great in guiding me in the right way,” he added.
But if every batter wants to get better at hitting from a distance, is there a chance that T20s may become one-dimensional?
“I don’t think so because it’s just that the batting in this tournament that has gone up another level. I think everyone is working so hard to hit those big sixes and fours and it’s now the bowler’s job to really follow that and try to take their game up a level as well and I think we are gonna get there.”
The left-hander believes that bowlers would eventually recover from their early shellacking.
“I’m very confident that all the bowlers will show up as well and as the tournament goes on the wickets will also start to slow down a little bit and those things will change and that’s how it goes.”
He was still impressed by teammate Tim David’s power-hitting abilities, though, as he blazed a 25-ball 70 to crush the CSK attack.
“We see him do this day in day out in practice sessions and every ball he faces he’s trying to hit them for a six and especially in the phase of the game that he comes into bat that’s his sole role and he’s done that so well over the last few years.
“It’s incredible and it all comes down to practice because he’s so confident in his technique and the areas that he wants to hit. When he goes out there he’s very clear and he understands which bowler he needs to target where and when you have that clarity in your head I think it makes it a lot easier,” he gushed.
Beyond the individual level, Devdutt claimed that RCB as a team has adopted the previous season’s theme of aggression without compromising caution.
“Even last season we had a couple of games early on where we struggled and ended up losing maybe three or four wickets and then it put us on the back foot. We had a conversation midway through last year that we needed to make sure that when the wicket is behaving in such a way you have to make sure that you have those wickets in hand and the moment the ball gets a little older it gets much easier to bat on.
“We had to make sure that we are not three four down by the 10-over mark and once we were able to do that I think we could just go from every ball. So, I think the way the entire unit has been batting since the start of last season has been really incredible,” he noted.
