RCB running out of time, says Nehra

Nothing seems to be working for Royal Challengers Bangalore who faced their fourth defeat on the trot. The batsmen continued to be shuffled, the catches were dropped and the bowlers couldn’t hedge in a decent target against Rajasthan Royals.

After being bemused by googlies from Shreyas Gopal, who consumed the dangerous Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers in the span of two overs, RCB's challenge fell flat. With dew becoming a key factor in the second innings, the bowling and fielding fell below the expected standards.

RCB dropped catches including those of Rajasthan skipper Ajinkya Rahane, and Steve Smith.

Coach Ashish Nehra remained positive about the team’s chances in the remaining 10 games but admitted they were fast running out of time.

“If you see towards the end, it came down to one run off two balls. The margin of error is so little. We didn’t bat well. Since the last two games, we have been dropping a lot of catches. If we hadn't dropped the catches, things would have been different,” Nehra said after RCB’s seven-wicket defeat.

“If you keep winning small moments then only you will win matches. The only problem for us is that we are running out of time as there are only 14 games.

"You can't make 200 batting first every time. Unfortunately, Virat (Kohli) and AB (de Villiers) got out in quick succession. We had a good start and then those wickets in the middle overs didn't help us. You have to give credit to Gopal as well, he bowled really well.”

The former left-arm pacer felt the bowling can do better. With the exception of Yuzvendra Chahal, none of the seamers, be it Umesh Yadav or Navdeep Saini, have delivered.

“Umesh didn't bowl that well in the last 2-3 games. The way Siraj and Chahal bowled today was really good. Saini is just playing his second or third game and (Marcus) Stoinis is a batsman who can bowl. The bowling surely can do better.”

Nehra also defended the repeated shuffling in batting. “This is such a fast-paced game where you might lose a couple of games here and there and you have to think about those little alterations. It's very difficult to go with the same eleven every time. If you see, Harbhajan (Singh) (of CSK) was the Man of the Match in the first game and he didn't get to play the third game which was also at the same venue (Chepauk),” he said.